...Start the party, Los Angeles, your Dodgers have won the World Series...

This was the announcer’s call to bring to a close the end to a ball classic for the ages, when the Los Angeles Dodgers clinched the World Series against the New York Yankees in game five of last season’s World Series.

A dream matchup for many, the potential head-to-head matchup between the superstar trios of Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, and Freddie Freeman against the New York Yankees’ all-elite of Aaron Judge, Juan Soto, and Giancarlo Stanton had added even more spice to an already elite fan base in LA and New York; Hollywood vs. the Bronx, West Coast vs. East Coast, and this was it...at the grandest stage of them all, in the World Series.

Yet again, the mischievous sporting fate delivered yet another masterclass (dis...) of its own, for by the time the series was shifting its base to the Bronx, New York was already down 2-0, and as the Dodgers went on to claim yet another game to be one shy of a title, the reality was setting in on the Bronx faithful. The City of Angels would go on to win their 8th World Championship in game five to close out an eventful season in the books.

The heroics of superstars Freddie Freeman (the World Series MVP), Shohei Ohtani (league MVP), Mookie Betts, and that whole roster in the Dodgers dugout then deserved all the plaudits. As a newbie then (I still am) to baseball, I have to admit, my first stint watching baseball was full of what Instagram critics would call a “bandwagon.” Sheer curiosity and intrigue led me to watch this whole sport.

The end of the NBA season, in which the Celtics had won the chip meant my early morning hours watching hoops had to be substituted for something else. And having moved ball clubs from the Angels to the Dodgers, the Ohtani heroics in what would be his third MVP season caught up to me and slowly started to follow along and joined the bandwagon. But could you blame me?

You know how once in a while, once in a specific sporting era, a generational talent comes around , changes the whole perception of a sport and brings on new faithfuls? That is what the Ohtani exploits in the sport did to me and let me guess, new fans too.

As the founder of the 50-50 club, the measure of Ohtani’s greatness is vast considering his value to his ball club, the city of Los Angeles, the big league, and even back at his home country, Japan. As social media captions would say, “He is different, real different. Could even be argued to be on the way to or already tipped to be the greatest in the sport, but that’s for analytics and the metrics people to argue.

His odds-defying season had catapulted his stocks even higher to earn him a third season MVP, finishing with 54 HRs (home runs) and 59 SBs (stolen bases), creating the first 50–50 club in the league’s history and I had to tune in to watch his massive hits game after game, with my most memorable one being his 3-run HR against the New York Mets to seal game 3 of the NLCS, amongst other heroics in a historic postseason run.

As this season’s playoffs push intensifies and the showman that is Ohtani continues to amaze fans and critics alike, my one-year anniversary as a baseball fan reminds me of what the whole meaning of falling in love with a relatively new sport is about. The early mornings trying to watch some of the games, the appreciation of games slotted earlier just before bedtime, the highlights, and the anticipation of waking up to a win or a loss are feelings like no other.

October offers the chance for superstar heroics, such as game one of last year’s World Series, when Freddie Freeman stepped up on the mound, with the bases loaded, down 3-2, and then boom! A walk-off grand slam, the first in the sport’s grandest stage. A similar run for whichever team gets to this year’s World Series would be to die for. For a bandwagoner like myself, you only hope that the first impressions continue to last and get to experience the joy that keeps on giving, that is sports; in this case, baseball.

As I sit at my desk smiling and savoring taking my chances and hoping on the “bandwagon” while the stocks still lasted, I am off to watch more baseball classics as much as I can, I want to find out more, to continue to understand the game more, maybe one day, here in Africa, especially in my country of Kenya, our own Ohtani will rise and make baseball a staple as it is in Mizusawa, Iwate, Japan, Ohtani’s place of birth.