Shohei Ohtani’s decision to choose the Dodgers did not come as a surprise

The answer to the $700 million question was staring us in the face all along.

Despite Shark Tank’s Robert Herjavec taking everyone on a wild-goose chase Friday as his private jet soared from Orange County to Toronto — to be fair to the Canadian mogul, he was an unwitting accomplice — was it ever truly a mystery where Shohei Ohtani would wind up?

The Dodgers’ all-out push for the planet’s best baseball player, a once-in-a-lifetime two-way star, was always there, hiding in plain sight, and Ohtani’s intentions hardly were a secret.

In July at the All-Star Game, where fans at T-Mobile Park chanted “Come to Seattle,” Ohtani publicly stated his desire to play for a contender and finally get a shot at October, something denied him for six years with the Angels.

“It [stinks] to lose,” Ohtani said then. “I want to win.”

In that respect, there’s no surer bet than the Dodgers, who have made the playoffs the past 11 years — earning 10 division titles — but won the World Series only once during this stretch, at the end of the COVID-shortened 2020 season.

Others surely made a case for themselves. But the Dodgers had the extra benefit of the two wealthy New York teams seemingly being content to sit this one out, passing on the current DH-only version of Ohtani while aiming their wallets at Japanese ace Yoshinobu Yamamoto instead.

Plus, the Dodgers already knew Ohtani was comfortable in SoCal — even with his frustration over losing right down the road in Anaheim — and spent this past year investing in an Ohtani fund by limiting their financial commitment to the 2024 payroll. Before signing Ohtani to this record-smashing 10-year, $700 million contract, L.A. had only $157 million on the books for next season. And even with Ohtani’s $70 million AAV now factored in, the Dodgers still rank only fourth in MLB, according to FanGraphs, behind the Yankees ($279M), Mets ($278M) and Phillies ($237M).

Ohtani’s contract reportedly comes with a lot of…