Shohei Ohtani news: WBC and Cy Young

Los Angeles Angels superstar Shohei Ohtani has himself in the news for a couple of different reasons.

First, he's announced that he will be playing for team Japan in the World Baseball Classic this spring.

This is awesome news, as Ohtani gets to play in front of Japanese fans for the first time in five years and represent his country. The tournament is a lot better when superstars like Ohtani represent their various countries.

The Angels also have Mike Trout playing for the US and will also be the team captain. Maybe we'll see a championship battle between the two?

Ohtani announces he will participate in WBC on same night he finished fourth in Cy Young balloting.

The other piece of Ohtani news is he finished fourth in the AL Cy Young Award balloting.

This was expected, as he was not named a finalist so he could not finish in the top three. Even without being a finalist, he earned more second-place votes than the third-place finisher Alek Manoah.

Strangely enough, Ohtani didn't even appear on one ballot (of course from an Astros writer).

While he probably should've been a finalist, for Ohtani to have the season on the mound that he did while hitting 34 home runs (including one off of each of the finalists) shows just how insane of a season he had.

Aaron Judge will probably win the MVP Award, but I'm curious to see how much of the vote Ohtani gets there. He truly had a better season in 2022 than he did in his MVP year.

The MVP announcement is today, so let's see where he finishes!