Are Portland and Oakland ready for Japan?

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With the monster contracts Japanese baseball studs Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto signed in the past week - both with the Los Angeles Dodgers - it’s not hard to ponder what they’re going to do with all the money they’re making in the next decade.

And, do they want to own anything sports wise? Like a baseball team?

With Oakland losing the A’s to Las Vegas, and Portland envisioning itself as the market the A’s should have left for, there’s a reality of two Major League Baseball-level markets open on the West Coast of the United States.

So, what if those markets: Oakland and Portland, got expansion teams owned all or in part by Ohtani and/or Yamamoto?

Expansion teams - in the Japanese League.

Getting into the National or American League in the U.S. is just not viable, and they couldn’t own a team they’d be playing against. But, Japanese baseball? Expansion for Japan’s National or Central League - in America? If Shohei and Yoshinobu were behind it, that’s an interesting thought to explore if two markets came in together, sort of like the Dodgers and Giants moving from New York to Los Angeles and San Francisco, respectively, in 1958.

Imagine the international exposure Portland would get from being in the Japanese League. Imagine the financial exposure. How many Japanese citizens would be filling airports to get to Portland? Hello hotel occupancy increase.

Same goes for Oakland, which has lost the A's and Raiders to Las Vegas, and the Warriors recently moved across the Bay to San Francisco.

Obviously, it wouldn't be the Majors, but it would be the Majors of the international world, one that owns the World Baseball Classic. So, maybe it's something to put forward to the Japanese dudes with the money to make it happen.

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