Sports
In Ohtani's Dodger blue hometown, a shrine to his baseball talent, and humanity
OSHU, Japan — Seems Hair and Spa in Oshu, a city in northern Japan, is crammed full with Dodgers memorabilia, but owner Hironobu Kanno is adamant that he isn’t really a Dodgers fan.
It was just past 9 a.m. and Kanno, who is 63 and sports a flowing blond ponytail, had just hurried to his shop to tune into Game 4 of the World Series.
Like the rest of Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani’s hometown, he was hoping, of course, that today was the day that the L.A. franchise would complete a sweep of its historical rivals, the Yankees.
Even so, he is clear that his loyalties lie not with the Dodgers but with Ohtani, the Oshu native who has taken Major League Baseball by storm and rallied the city behind him in a way only a hometown can.
If Ohtani were to magically join the Yankees tomorrow? Would Kanno trade out his Dodgers blue for Yankee stripes?
Hironobu Kanno is surrounded by his collection of Ohtani memorabilia at his beauty salon in Oshu, Japan. Kanno started the collection with a signed ball in 2013, when Ohtani was playing in a Japanese league.
(Eugene Hoshiko / Associated Press)
“Of course,” Kanno said, without pause.
In reality, Ohtani is on a 10-year contract with the Dodgers, meaning Kanno’s loyalty is, too.
Per a rule he has instituted for the World Series, every single one of the hairdressers in his shop, including his wife, Satsuki, was tending to customers while wearing a blue Dodgers jersey.
His two customers were also watching the game — whether they like it or not — because Kanno years ago had monitors installed at every seat in order to avoid missing any of Ohtani’s games.
This, one so far, seemed to bode well.
On the main television in the waiting area, Freddie Freeman had hit another first inning homer, making Satsuki and Keiko, one of the stylists, cry out “Freeman!”
The inside of the business is only part salon and mostly museum. It is stacked floor to ceiling with Ohtani-related items that Kanno has spent 11 years and close to $100,000 acquiring, including signed baseballs, dozens of bobbleheads and figurines, jerseys, hats, cleats, batting gloves and a life-size cutout of Ohtani in his Dodgers uniform.
His favorite piece is a hat signed by the entire Ohtani-led Japanese national team that defeated the U.S. squad in last year’s World Baseball Classic. That one is priceless.
“I have a secret connection on the team who helped me get this,” he said. “I can’t really talk about it.”
And in the last year alone, around 1,000 fans — Japanese and foreign — have visited the shop to see all of this for themselves, some with religious reverence and others with fizzy excitement.
One particularly dedicated fan — a young Taiwanese woman — visits every year or so, to ooh and ah at the new additions to the collection.
On her most recent trip she asked Kanno to give her the exact haircut sported by Mamiko Tanaka, Ohtani’s wife.
“Yes, I gave it to her,” Kanno said with a chuckle, gesturing at a picture of Ohtani and Tanaka hanging on the wall.
::
Kanno started his collection in 2013, with a ball signed by Ohtani he got at a game he attended when the Dodgers superstar — then just 18 years old — was playing for his first professional team: the Japanese league’s Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters.
It had been a dark time for Oshu, where Kanno had been born and raised.
Bobbleheads make up part of Hironobu Kanno’s collection in Oshu, northeastern Japan, the Dodger star’s hometown.
(Eugene Hoshiko / Associated Press)
Two years earlier, the Tōhoku region of Japan, where Oshu sits, had been hit by the Great East Japan Earthquake, which killed more than 19,000 people and triggered the tsunami that caused the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
For the devastated people of the region, news of a local baseball wunderkind making it in Japan’s big leagues was a balm.
“It felt like Ohtani represented the hope of the region’s people,” Kanno said.
The signed ball had come when Kanno, too, was reaching for a fresh start.
As a young man, Kanno had been a successful hairstylist with a grind-all-day work ethic, winning international competitions that took him on business trips all over the world, followed by a corporate career at a major beauty company.
But sometime in his late 40s, Satsuki had told him: “All you do is work, your family is falling apart. We have money, but we are not happy. You are losing what is important to you and us.”
Shattered by the realization that she was right, Kanno left behind his high-flying life and opened Seems Hair and Spa in 2010.
“I wanted to settle down in my own space in my hometown, where I can chat to people casually and live at a slower pace than before,” he said.
And so the museum was born.
Hironobu Kanno, representative of a private fan club of Shohei Ohtani of the Los Angeles Dodgers, speaks at his beauty salon in Oshu, northeastern Japan, the hometown of Ohtani.
(Eugene Hoshiko / Associated Press)
Oshu, a semi-rural city of around 114,000, is not exactly a hub of action. Sometimes the streets in the town known for cattle ranching, apple orchards and ironworking can be so quiet it feels like a ghost town. But Kanno’s collection has made him surprisingly well-connected to the wider world.
Among his contacts is former player and current Dodgers broadcaster José Mota.
“We chat online all the time,” Kanno said, pulling out his phone as proof.
The day before, Kanno had sent Mota a few selfies of him in a Dodger blue crowd at a World Series viewing party the city of Oshu had hosted at a local auditorium.
“That’s beautiful,” Mota had texted back.
::
It was the third inning of Game 4 and Ohtani, who had partially dislocated his shoulder in Game 2, was standing at the plate.
“His swing is better than yesterday,” Kanno observed.
A pop fly out.
“Ahhhhh,” he groaned. “Maybe his injury is still bothering him.”
Like many in Oshu, Kanno feels protective of Ohtani in a way perhaps only the people of this town can.
Few outsiders may know, for example, that Ohtani comes back to the city every year or so to visit his parents.
Many of the longtime locals are aware when he does, but there is an unwritten code of silence not to reveal this — or his parents’ address — to the media.
“For example, people from Ohsu know what restaurant Ohtani’s family goes to whenever Ohtani is here,” Kanno said.
“But they don’t tell this to the media so that Ohtani will feel safe when he is home.”
It is a rule that is sacrosanct to Kanno.
Sometimes, journalists will ask Kanno if he can tip them off to where Ohtani’s parents live. When that happens, Kanno sends them away.
And although he could find a way to ask Ohtani’s parents to help him get their son’s blessing for his ultimate goal of establishing an official Ohtani museum in the city, he refuses to stoop so low.
“Oshu city wants to support him in a pure way,” he said.
::
By the eighth inning, a customer had canceled her perm appointment with Kanno, allowing him to watch the game slip away from the Dodgers.
Following a grand slam by the Yankees’ Anthony Volpe in the third, which made Kanno hang his head and groan, New York was piling on the runs to make the score 11-4, seemingly hell-bent on avoiding a sweep.
Hironobu Kanno started collecting Ohtani memorabilia soon after he made a major change in his own life.
(Eugene Hoshiko / Associated Press)
“I have to give it to the Yankees today,” he said.
Although Kanno was confident that the Dodgers would end up taking the series, he knows that the Pride of Oshu City is destined for more than just this one championship, anyway.
“Ohtani wants to be the greatest player to ever play the game. It is an endless journey for him,” he said.
And more than the accolades, what Kanno respects most about Ohtani is that he seems to have figured out something about life that the stylist himself realized too late.
“Even at his young age, Ohtani knows what is necessary for his life, what his priorities are,” Kanno said.
From the jumble of magazines and Ohtani literature strewn about on the coffee table in the waiting area, Kanno produced a copy of Ohtani’s Mandala Chart, a list of life goals arranged in interconnected squares that the baseball phenom wrote as a sophomore in high school.
Alongside the baseball goals, like increasing the “perfect the forkball” or “strengthen the body core” are the qualities that Kanno has been relearning in Oshu: “sensitivity,” “caring,” becoming someone worthy of trust and love.
Special correspondent Momo Nagayama contributed to this report.
Sports
Law firm fighting for women’s sports in SCOTUS battle comments on ruling possibly impacting SJSU trans lawsuit
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
A law firm leading the charge in the ongoing Supreme Court case over trans athletes in women’s sports has responded after a federal judge suggested the case’s ruling could impact a separate case involving a similar issue.
Colorado District Judge Kato Crews deferred ruling in motions to dismiss former San Jose State volleyball co-captain Brooke Slusser’s lawsuit against the California State University (CSU) system until after a ruling in the B.P.J. v. West Virginia Supreme Court case, which is expected to come in June.
Slusser filed the lawsuit against representatives of her school and the Mountain West Conference in fall 2024 after she allegedly was made to share bedrooms and changing spaces with trans teammate Blaire Fleming for a whole season without being informed that Fleming is a biological male.
Meanwhile, the B.P.J. case went to the Supreme Court after a trans teen sued West Virginia to block the state’s law that prevents males from competing in girls’ high school sports.
The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) is the primary law firm defending West Virginia in that case at the Supreme Court, and has now responded to news that Slusser’s lawsuit could be affected by the SCOTUS ruling.
“We hope the ruling from the Supreme Court will affirm that Title IX was designed to guarantee equal opportunity for women, not to let male athletes displace women and girl in competition. It is crucial that sports be separated by sex for not only the equal opportunity of women but for safety and privacy. Title IX should protect women’s right to compete in their own sports. Allowing men to compete in the female category reverses 50 years of advancement for women,” ADF Vice President of Litigation Strategies Jonathan Scruggs said.
Slusser’s attorney, Bill Bock of the Independent Council on Women’s Sports, expects a Supreme Court ruling in favor of the legal defense representing West Virginia, thus helping his case.
(Left) Brooke Slusser (10) of the San Jose State Spartans serves the ball during the first set against the Air Force Falcons at Falcon Court at East Gym in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on Oct. 19, 2024. (Right) Blaire Fleming #3 of the San Jose State Spartans looks on during the third set against the Air Force Falcons at Falcon Court at East Gym on October 19, 2024 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. ( Andrew Wevers/Getty Images; Andrew Wevers/Getty Images)
“We’re looking forward to the case going forward,” Bock told Fox News Digital.
“I believe that the court is going to find that Title IX operates on the basis of biological sex, without regard to an assumed or professed gender, and so just like the congress and the members of congress that passed Title IX in 1972, allowed this specifically provided for in the regulations that there had to be separate men’s and women’s teams based on biological sex, I think the court is going to see that is the original meaning of the statute and apply it in that way, and I think it’s going to be a big win in women’s sports.”
The Supreme Court’s conservative majority appeared prepared to rule in favor of West Virginia after oral arguments on Jan. 13.
Slusser spoke on the steps of the Supreme Court on Jan. 13 while oral arguments took place inside, sharing her experience with a divided crowd of opposing protesters.
With Fleming on its roster, SJSU reached the 2024 conference final by virtue of a forfeit by Boise State in the semifinal round. SJSU lost in the final to Colorado State.
Slusser went on to develop an eating disorder due to the anxiety and trauma from the scandal and dropped out of her classes the following semester. The eating disorder became so severe, that Slusser said she lost her menstrual cycle for nine months. Her decision to drop her classes resulted in the loss of her scholarship, and her parents said they had to foot the bill out of pocket for an unfinished final semester of college.
President Donald Trump’s Department of Education determined in January that SJSU violated Title IX in its handling of the situation involving Fleming, and has given the university an ultimatum to agree to a series of resolutions or face a referral to the Department of Justice.
Among the department’s findings, it determined that a female athlete discovered that the trans student allegedly conspired to have a member of an opposing team spike her in the face during a match. ED claims that “SJSU did not investigate the conspiracy, but later subjected the female athlete to a Title IX complaint for ‘misgendering’ the male athlete in online videos and interviews.”
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
SJSU trans player Blaire Fleming and teammate Brooke Slusser went to a magic show and had Thanksgiving together in Las Vegas despite an ongoing lawsuit over Fleming being transgender. (Thien-An Truong/San Jose State Athletics)
SJSU Athletic Director Jeff Konya told Fox News Digital in a July interview that he was satisfied with how the university handled the situation involving Fleming.
“I think everybody acted in the best possible way they could, given the circumstances,” Konya said.
Follow Fox News Digital’s sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Related Article
Sports
Myles Garrett cited for speeding a ninth time, an elite pass rusher seemingly always in a rush
Myles Garrett is in a hurry to become the greatest pass rusher in NFL history. The Cleveland Browns All-Pro defensive end set the single-season sack record in 2025 and has cracked the top 20 career leaders after only nine seasons.
“I’m going to take that down, and I prefer I take it down in the next five years,” Garrett told Casino Guru News last month.
Off the field, however, his urgency to get from point A to B is a problem. He’s accumulating speeding tickets at an alarming rate.
On Feb. 21, Garrett was handed his ninth speeding ticket since his NFL career began in 2017. He was cited for driving 94 mph in a 70-mph zone on Interstate 71 between Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio.
The citation from the Wayne County Sheriff’s Office says Garrett was driving his green 2024 Porsche at 1:35 a.m., returning home after attending a Miami of Ohio basketball game in Oxford.
Body cam footage shows the officer telling Garrett that she kept the charge under 100 mph so that a court appearance wouldn’t be mandatory. Garrett reportedly still holds a Texas driver’s license — he attended Texas A&M — and told the officer that he did not have an Ohio license.
Cleveland Browns’ Myles Garrett wears a jacket displaying his girlfriend Chloe Kim before the women’s snowboarding halfpipe finals at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Livigno, Italy.
(Lindsey Wasson / AP)
The officer wrote that the famously affable Garrett was “kind and cooperative,” and that drugs and alcohol were not a factor.
Garrett’s need for speed flies in the face of his persona. He has written poetry since high school, peppers social media with inspirational sayings and donates time and money to several charities.
His girlfriend is two-time gold-medal-winning U.S. Olympic snowboarder Chloe Kim, for whom he wrote a poem he shared on social media: “You enrapture fools to kings, and exist without a peer, put on this Earth for many things, but our love is why you’re here.”
Verse hasn’t slowed his roll. On Aug. 9 he was cited for ticket No. 8, clocked at 100 mph in a 60-mph zone in a Cleveland suburb a day after the Browns returned home from a preseason game at Carolina.
Garrett’s seventh ticket followed a frightening crash in 2022. He flipped his gray 2021 Porsche 911 Turbo S off State Road in Sharon Township and he and a female passenger were injured. He was cited for failing to control his vehicle due to unsafe speeds on what had been a slick roadway.
A witness told a responding police officer that Garrett’s vehicle went airborne, took out a fire hydrant and rolled three times. Garrett sustained shoulder and biceps sprains and was sidelined for the Browns’ game that week against the Atlanta Falcons. His companion was not seriously injured.
Cleveland television station WKYC reported that in September 2021 Garrett was stopped twice in a 24-hour period — for driving 120 and 105 mph. The infractions occurred on Interstate 71 in Medina County, where the speed limit is 70 mph, and he paid fines of $267 and $287.
A year earlier, Garrett was cited for driving 100 mph in a 65-mph zone of Interstate 77 — again while driving a Porsche — and paid a $308 fine. He accumulated his first batch of speeding tickets in 2017 and 2018, and the police reports recite similar circumstances: Garrett driving well over the speed limit, cited without incident, paid a nominal fine.
The piddly fines certainly aren’t a deterrent. Garrett, 30, and the Browns agreed to a four-year contract extension in March 2025 that made him the highest-paid non-quarterback in NFL history at the time. The deal pays the seven-time All-Pro more than $40 million a season and includes more than $123 million in guaranteed money.
He set the NFL single-season sack record with 23.0 last season, surpassing the 22.5 accumulated by T.J. Watt and Michael Strahan. Garrett has 125.5 career sacks, averaging 14 a season, a pace that would enable him to break Bruce Smith’s career record of 200 in five years.
“That is definitely on my mind to go out there and get,” Garrett said. “That’s a goal I’ve had for years now since college.”
Garrett has declined to discuss his driving habits.
“I’d honestly prefer to talk about football and this team than anything I’m doing off the field other than the back-to-school event that I did the other day,” he told reporters after ticket No. 8 in August, referring to a charity appearance.
“I try to keep my personal life personal. And I’d rather focus on this team when I can.”
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
Former ESPN broadcaster Keith Olbermann once again incited backlash on social media Wednesday after he called late legendary college football coach Lou Holtz a “legendary scumbag” in an X post on the day Holtz was announced dead.
“Legendary scumbag, yes,” Olbermann wrote in response to a clip of Holtz criticizing former President Joe Biden in 2020 for supporting abortion rights.
Olbermann received scathing criticism in response to his post on X.
“You’re a scumbag that needs mental help,” one X user wrote to Olbermann.
One user echoed that sentiment, writing to Olbermann, “You’re the real scumbag here. Lou Holtz had more class, integrity, and genuine decency in his pinky finger than you’ll ever show in your lifetime.”
Another user wrote, “You’re a grumpy, lonely, Godless man. All the things Lou Holtz was not.”
Keith Olbermann speaks onstage during the Olbermann panel at the ESPN portion of the 2013 Summer Television Critics Association tour at the Beverly Hilton Hotel July 24, 2013, in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)
Olbermann has made it a pattern of sharing politically charged far-left statements that are often combative and ridiculed on social media, typically resulting in immense backlash.
After the U.S. men’s hockey team’s gold medal win, Olbermann heavily criticized the team for accepting an invitation from President Trump to the State of the Union address. Olbermann wrote on X that any members of the men’s team who attended the event were “declaring their indelible stupidity and misogyny,” while praising the women’s team for declining the invitation.
In January, Olbermann attacked former University of Kentucky women’s swimmer Kaitlynn Wheeler for celebrating a women’s rights rally outside the U.S. Supreme Court during oral arguments for two cases focused on the legality of biological male trans athletes in women’s sports.
Former Notre Dame football coach Lou Holtz listens before being presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House in Washington, D.C., Dec, 3, 2020. (Doug Mills/The New York Times/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“It’s still about you trying to find an excuse for a lifetime wasted trying to succeed in sports without talent,” Olbermann wrote in response to Wheeler’s post.
In 2025, Olbermann faced significant backlash after posting (and later deleting) a message on X aimed at CNN contributor Scott Jennings, that said, “You’re next motherf—–,” shortly after the assassination of conservative influencer Charlie Kirk.
Holtz was a stern supporter of President Donald Trump, even saying in February 2024 that Trump needed to “coach America back to greatness!”
Near the end of Trump’s first term, shortly after former President Joe Biden defeated him in the 2020 election, Trump awarded Holtz with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award of the United States.
After Holtz’s death was announced Wednesday, several top GOP figures paid tribute to the coach on social media.
Those GOP lawmakers included senators Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala.; Todd Young, R-Ind.; Tom Cotton, R-Ark.; and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; representatives Greg Murphy, R-N.C.; David Rouzer, R-N.C.; Erin Houchin, R-Ind.; and Steve Womack, R-Ark.; and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis; Indiana Gov. Mike Braun; U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon; and Rudy Giuliani.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
Lou Holtz, former Notre Dame football coach, addresses the America First Policy Institute’s America First Agenda Summit at the Marriott Marquis July 26, 2022. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc)
At the time of publication, prominent Democrat leaders have appeared silent on Holtz’s passing, including prominent Democrats with a football background.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who worked as an assistant high school football coach; Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., who was a recruiting target for Holtz in 1986 as a college prospect; Rep. Colin Allred, D-Texas, who played in the NFL; and Rep. Kam Buckner, D-Ill., who played football for the University of Illinois, have not posted acknowledging Holtz’s death.
Follow Fox News Digital’s sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Related Article
Signs of spring blooming at Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve after wet, warm winter
Deen: Avalanche Solve Roster Needs. What’s Next? | Colorado Hockey Now
A Character-Rich Family Home in Connecticut That Bridges Past and Present
Delaware Officials Highlight DTRN360, Innovative Behavioral Health Care Coordination Platform – State of Delaware News
Florida college Republicans group chat reveals racist texts: ‘Avoid the coloreds like the plague’
Florida High School Football Rankings: Top 25 teams – Oct. 21
Cleary's 21 help Le Moyne down Central Connecticut State 69-64 in OT
How old is Bo Nix? What to know about Oregon quarterback ahead of 2024 NFL Draft
99th annual Pony Swim held in Virginia
Indiana Members Credit Union announced as new anchor tenant at Bottleworks District
Map: 4.9-Magnitude Earthquake Shakes Louisiana
Paxton vows he’s ‘staying in this race’ even if Trump backs Cornyn in Texas GOP clash
Which Kurdish groups is the US rallying to fight Iran?
Man accused of plot to assassinate Trump testifies Iran pressured him, says Biden and Haley were other possible targets
DHS defends McLaughlin against allegations husband’s company profited millions from ad contracts: ‘Baseless’
-
World1 week agoExclusive: DeepSeek withholds latest AI model from US chipmakers including Nvidia, sources say
-
Massachusetts1 week agoMother and daughter injured in Taunton house explosion
-
Wisconsin4 days agoSetting sail on iceboats across a frozen lake in Wisconsin
-
Maryland5 days agoAM showers Sunday in Maryland
-
Florida5 days agoFlorida man rescued after being stuck in shoulder-deep mud for days
-
Massachusetts3 days agoMassachusetts man awaits word from family in Iran after attacks
-
Denver, CO1 week ago10 acres charred, 5 injured in Thornton grass fire, evacuation orders lifted
-
Oregon6 days ago2026 OSAA Oregon Wrestling State Championship Results And Brackets – FloWrestling