LOS ANGELES — Tokyo Dome was the center of the Japanese baseball world again this week, but this time it wasn’t for a pennant race or a World Baseball Classic showdown. It was for a goodbye. On Friday, more than thirty thousand people filtered through the ballpark to say farewell to Shigeo Nagashima, the Yomiuri Giants icon known simply as “Mr. Giants” and “Mr. Pro Baseball.” And right in the middle of it, at least on the video board, was the Dodgers’ own Shohei Ohtani.
For Dodgers fans who have gotten used to seeing Shohei redefine what’s possible on a baseball field, it was a different kind of performance. Ohtani recorded a video message that played during the ceremony, paying his respects to the man who helped define post-war Japanese baseball. He began by offering his condolences and then thanking Nagashima “as one junior who works in baseball” for the achievements and memories he left behind for everyone who loves the game.
The scale of the day told you how big Nagashima really was. In the morning “relations” session, about 2,800 people from the baseball world, politics and business attended. In the afternoon, roughly 22,800 fans came through the Tokyo Dome gates, bringing the day’s total to around 32,400 people paying their respects. On the field, there were flowers, a large portrait with his familiar Giants No. 3, and a parade of voices trying to do justice to a career that stretched from the late 1950s all the way to a lifetime honorary manager title.
Sadaharu Oh, Nagashima’s longtime teammate and the “O” half of the famous “O-N” combo, spoke of a man who felt like the sun itself. Oh said he was certain that Nagashima, “who was like a bright sun,” would continue to live on in people’s hearts. Hideki Matsui, the former Giants and Yankees slugger, remembered the one-on-one batting work that shaped him, saying Nagashima “showed me the right path as a baseball player, lit that path, and guided me strongly.” Actor Kinya Kitaoji kept it simple and emotional: “Our gratitude to Mr. Nagashima is eternal.” (All from the Yomiuri Shimbun report of the ceremony.)
Ohtani’s message fit right into that theme of light. He talked about the first time he ever had dinner with Nagashima, remembering that it felt like there was a literal glow around the older man, and that he’d never seen anyone quite like that before. Even for someone who’s now the face of MLB’s global game, you could hear the fan in his voice.
He also used the moment to talk about responsibility. In the video, Ohtani said that when he looks back at the road Nagashima walked, he feels that the “baton” has been passed to the current generation, and that it’s his mission — and his peers’ mission — to pass that baton along to the next wave of players. For Dodgers fans, that sounds a lot like the way he plays: fully aware that what he does now will shape what comes next for Japanese players in the majors.
Ohtani closed by echoing one of Nagashima’s most famous lines. Nagashima once said, “My Giants are forever immortal,” as he stepped away as a player. In his message, Ohtani said he believes Nagashima himself “will never fade,” and that his personality and his achievements will go on shining in Japanese baseball and in the wider sports world. Then he finished with a simple, “Thank you for your long years of hard work,” and let the silence do the rest.
If you’re a Dodger fan who mostly knows Nagashima as a name on an old NPB highlights reel, here’s the quick snapshot: third baseman for the Giants from 1958–74, lifetime .305 hitter with 444 homers and 2,471 hits. He helped drive nine straight Japan Series titles alongside Oh, then managed the club to more league flags and Japan Series wins in the 1990s and 2000. His No. 3 is retired, his plaque is in the Japanese Hall of Fame, and he even carried the Olympic torch in Tokyo in 2021.
When Nagashima passed away in June, Ohtani had already spoken about how much the meetings meant to him. He admitted he never saw Nagashima play in real time, but said that actually sitting with him, talking almost entirely about baseball, left the impression of someone whose love for the game ran incredibly deep. He called the news “very unfortunate,” and said he hoped that current players could carry that passion on to the next generation.
That’s what made Friday’s farewell so striking from a Dodger-centric point of view. On one side you had Nagashima, the star who helped turn Japanese pro baseball into a national obsession, the man whose walk-off homer in front of the Emperor and Empress in 1959 is still replayed on TV.On the other, you had Ohtani, now in Dodger blue, speaking from Los Angeles but firmly rooted in that same lineage.
We’ll see plenty of Shohei in the batter’s box and on the bases again next spring. For one afternoon in Tokyo, though, his job wasn’t to hit balls over the pavilion at Dodger Stadium. It was to stand in front of a camera, talk about an older man’s light, and promise to keep carrying the baton that Mr. Giants handed him.
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