Here's How Shohei Ohtani's Magnum Opus Measures Up to the Best Games in MLB History

In addition to establishing the 50-50 club, Shohei Ohtani also broke the Los Angeles Dodgers' single-season home run record amidst his unique 6-for-6 performance.

Sep 19, 2024; Miami, Florida, USA; Los Angeles Dodgers designated hitter Shohei Ohtani (17) reacts to a standing ovation from the fans after hitting his 50th home run of the season against the Miami Marlins during the seventh inning at loanDepot Park. / Rhona Wise-Imagn Images

Every baseball fan on the planet has known Shohei Ohtani was a unicorn for years, but he took that to a whole new level Thursday against the Miami Marlins.

The Los Angeles Dodgers designated hitter notably became the first player in MLB history to join the 50 home run, 50 stolen base club by belting three homers and swiping two bags. He was showered in praise for his achievements big and small, which included breaking the franchise record for home runs in a single season.

Ohtani didn't crawl to the finish line, either. He blew past it, lapping the competition by establishing the 50-50 club in fewer team games than anyone had ever reached 40-40, as noted by SB Nation's Eric Stephen.

And the 30-year-old Japanese superstar happened to make it to those milestones in one of the most insane games ever seen.

Ohtani finished the night 6-for-6 with three home runs, two doubles, a single, two stolen bases, four runs and 10 RBI. Amid it all, the Dodgers beat the Marlins 20-4 and clinched a spot in the postseason for the 12th year in a row.

There were countless stats shared throughout the game that demonstrated how unique Ohtani's outing was, each one more unbelievable than the last. Instead of diving into every single one of them, here's the general summary: no one in the history of baseball did what Ohtani just did on Thursday.

Beyond the specific combination of home runs, doubles, stolen bases and RBI that Ohtani had, though, there are plenty of other ways to measure just how dominant he was. Typically, a single game wouldn't warrant this kind of attention, especially when a player just reached a pair of previously unachievable season-long benchmarks, but Ohtani is far from a typical player.

The performance Ohtani posted on Thursday could very well have been the best single-game showing by any hitter in MLB history.

The "hitter" qualifier comes into play because when it comes to pitchers, there is actually a way to best what Ohtani just did. A perfect game is exactly what it sounds like, since retiring all 27 batters is the very best a pitcher can do.

There have only been 24 perfect games in MLB history, including the postseason. Perhaps the best of them was Don Larsen's, which came in Game 5 of the 1956 World Series, or maybe it was Sandy Koufax's 14-strikeout perfect game in a 1-0 win over the Chicago Cubs in 1965.

Hitters don't have perfect games, since there isn't exactly a minimum or maximum amount of production that's baked into an individual performance at the plate. A player could hit 12 home runs in a game, theoretically, so it's hard to compare their stat lines to something hard-capped like what pitchers can do.

So, literal perfect games aside, who else has had a game that could stand up to Ohtani's magnum opus?

Shawn Green owns MLB's single-game total base record with 19, which he set when he went 6-for-6 with four home runs, a double and a single on May 23, 2002. Joe Adock and Josh Hamilton did the same, only without the single, so they had 18 total bases apiece in their best games.

There are three other players who reached 17 total bases in a game before Ohtani, and Cincinnati Reds second baseman Scooter Gennett led them all with 10 RBI on June 6, 2017.

Ohtani joined the 17-total base club on Thursday, on top of tying Gennett with 10 RBI. He is the only one in the group to record a stolen base, so adding in his two swipes would bring him to 19 true total bases.

That would tie Ohtani with Green in terms of bases touched, and he managed to do it in more dynamic fashion. While Green scored six runs to Ohtani's four, Ohtani drove in 10 runs to Green's seven.

Before Ohtani on Thursday, Kirk Gibson and Braggo Roth shared the record for most total bases in a multi-stolen base game with 11, per MLB.com's Sarah Langs.

It's hard to pin down to total value of a single performance by a hitter, since there isn't an equivalent to what pitchers have with Game Score. There is WAR, though, and Ohtani added 0.7 to his season total on Thursday, by FanGraphs' calculations.

Funnily enough, going by WAR, the beatdown Ohtani put on the Marlins on Thursday wasn't even the best of his career. Ohtani went 3-for-3 with two home runs and a walk against the Chicago White Sox on June 27, 2023, on top of striking out 10 and allowing four hits, two walks and one earned run across 6.1 innings pitched.

Ohtani added 0.8 fWAR that day – 0.4 at the plate and 0.4 on the mound.

Now what if I told you this somehow isn’t even the most War Shohei Ohtani has ever had in a day because on June 27th, 2023 he did this:

At the plate: 3-3, 2 HR, 2 RBI, 1 BB
On the mound: 6.1 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 10 K’s

0.8 War in a single day. https://t.co/H9AhoQEZCR pic.twitter.com/vCdiyRlneq

— Addison (@YankeeWRLD) September 20, 2024

Maybe Ohtani, as a two-way player, can throw a perfect game one day, all while racking up 19 total bases at the plate and three steals on the basepaths. But even then, he wouldn't be able to do so on the same night he pioneered the 50-50 club, broke his franchise's single-season home run record and punched his very first ticket to the playoffs.

In conclusion, baseball is a funky sport. For all of the stats that have dominated the game for the past century, no solitary figure can provide a satisfactory answer for "greatest game ever played."

That being said, everyone who tuned in to see Ohtani explode on Thursday should sleep easy knowing they just witnessed history.

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