Shohei Ohtani on 'MLB The Show 22': How it happened

By Ben Verlander
FOX Sports MLB Analyst

The reigning unanimous AL MVP, Shohei Ohtani, and the greatest baseball video game out there, MLB The Show. It's a match made in heaven.

On Jan. 31, it was announced that the newest version of the game, "MLB The Show 22," would feature Ohtani on the cover.

It seemed like an easy decision, and according to Ramone Russell, MLB The Show product development communications and brand strategist, it was. 

"It was a no-brainer this year to put Shohei Ohtani on the cover," he said. "A little bit before the All-Star break, our conversations about Shohei being on the cover became louder and louder. Then, pretty much by the All-Star Game, we were locked in.

"It HAD to be him." 

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But while the decision was easy, the process of how it came together was anything but.

Once the decision was made to have Ohtani on the cover, the idea was floated to have him on the MVP Collector's edition.

That's in part because the story of Shohei Ohtani’s baseball career goes back to his childhood days and the influence Anime and Manga have had on his baseball career.

In high school, Shohei read a Manga that made him want to be an even better baseball player and made him want to focus on being a two-way player.

"We thought, ‘Is there any way we can tap into that and his Japanese heritage and Anime and Manga in a way that’s also very respectful?’" Russell said of the thought process.

"It’s not something that we took lightly."

Once they had the idea, they needed an artist.

Enter Takashi Okazaki, who already had a relationship with Playstation and happened to be a huge fan of Ohtani. 

Russell said that when his team reached out to Okazaki about this opportunity, his answer was simple: "I’ll clear my schedule."

The MLB The Show crew then created a brief vision document for Takashi. The main focus of the cover was simple: "How do we tell the duality of Shohei being a two-way player?"

With that, Okazaki was off and running. 

"We spent about four or five months working on the cover. Had a lot of different iterations. And what everyone saw last week on the release is what we landed on," Russell said.

"Takashi did such an amazing job. He really did a good job making him look like a larger than life Manga superhero or Anime superhero."

I think this MLB The Show cover is the most incredible video game cover I've ever seen, and it was extremely special for me to learn the story behind it on "Flippin' Bats."

In the episode, Ramone Russell and I go into detail about the cover, as well as some other exciting things to come in this year's game. 

We also share some exclusive trailers and a video of Ohtani seeing the cover for the first time.

This episode was special for me. It was a collision of my worlds: video games, baseball and Shohei Ohtani. And I can’t imagine a more perfect cover to capture Ohtani's story.

As Russell said in this week’s episode: "We can’t just have him on the cover looking human because what he’s doing in real life is superhuman."

Ben Verlander is an MLB Analyst for FOX Sports and the host of the "Flippin' Bats" podcast. Born and raised in Richmond, Virginia, Verlander was an All-American at Old Dominion University before he joined his brother, Justin, in Detroit as a 14th-round pick of the Tigers in 2013. He spent five years in the Tigers organization. Follow him on Twitter @Verly32.