BOSTON — Shohei Ohtani had already hit a ball 109 miles an hour and thrown 81 of his 99 pitches for strikes, so when he strode to the plate in the eighth inning of perhaps the greatest game ever played here, he lined a fastball off the Green Monster so hard he knocked his own number off the wall.
“He’s the best player in the league,” Red Sox starter Rich Hill told reporters after Thursday’s game was over and the Angels had won 8–0 to take the series. “I think that’s one thing everybody can pretty much unanimously agree upon. It’s pretty special to see somebody like that come along. I think everybody should be really appreciating what we’re seeing, because it’s something we haven’t seen in 100 years and we may never see it again for another 100 years.”
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