Shohei Ohtani

Shohei Ohtani donating 60,000 baseball gloves to kids in Japan

The MLB superstar is giving back to his home country

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Two-way star and coveted free agent Shohei Ohtani is donating about 60,000 baseball gloves to Japanese elementary schools.

Ohtani, a free agent who has spent the past six seasons with the Los Angeles Angels, announced Wednesday on Instagram that he's donating the youth gloves to schools throughout Japan.

โ€œIโ€™m happy to announce that I will be donating approximately 60,000 youth gloves to every elementary school in Japan,โ€ Ohtani said. โ€œThat comes out to around 20,000 elementary schools. Iโ€™m hoping the kids can spend their days happily with a lot of energy through baseball.โ€

The gloves Ohtani is donating are from New Balance, one of his corporate partners.

The 29-year-old Ohtani is coming off a season in which he batted .304 with 44 homers and also went 10-5 on the mound with a 3.14 ERA. He had Tommy John surgery in September for the second time in six years.

Copyright The Associated Press
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