After undergoing Tommy John surgery in the 2018 offseason, Shohei Ohtani did not pitch at all in 2019 and played exclusively as a hitter.

He appeared in 106 games, finishing with a .286 batting average, 18 home runs, and 62 RBIs.

His numbers were roughly in line with his rookie season, and his OPS of .848 was by no means poor.

Ohtani was not satisfied with those results—but he wasn’t overly pessimistic either.

In fact, he seemed to feel a clear sense of progress.

The reason, he explained, was this:

He was able to feel strong frustration about those results.

The numbers themselves were not bad.

Considering it was his second year in the majors, and that he was still rehabbing as a pitcher, it would have been easy to accept them.

But Ohtani’s standards had already risen.

That is why he felt such strong frustration.

If your goals are low, you may reach them easily and feel satisfied.

But it becomes harder to feel that you have truly grown.

On the other hand, when your goals are high, failing to reach them brings frustration—

but it also drives growth.

Even if the numbers in his first and second seasons looked similar, the belief that “I should be capable of more” only grew stronger.

And with that belief came greater frustration—

which, in turn, became the fuel for further improvement.

Source

This quote comes from a Japanese book published in Japan and is not currently available in English.

Yakyu Shonen II: MLB Edition 2018–2024, p.99