When you follow a path that others have already taken, their experiences can serve as a guide.

Their successes become examples to imitate. Their failures become mistakes to avoid.

But pioneers do not have that luxury.

Shohei Ohtani grew up in a baseball environment where most coaching methods were based on past experience. Coaches teach what they have seen before, what has worked for previous players, and what they themselves once learned.

Yet Ohtani was not an ordinary case.

Physically, he was already unusual for a Japanese player—tall, powerful, and extraordinarily athletic. On top of that, he pursued the unprecedented challenge of becoming both a pitcher and a hitter at the professional level.

For coaches and managers, there was no clear blueprint.

Even Ohtani himself recognized this.

During his years with the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters, he once said that there were no senior players he could learn from in this particular path. Instead, he had to identify what needed to be done and build the process step by step on his own.

Because of that reality, he adopted a simple philosophy:

Nothing is wasted.

When there is no precedent, experimentation becomes essential. Training methods, adjustments, and routines must all be tested and evaluated through experience.

Every attempt—even the ones that do not produce immediate results—becomes part of the learning process.

For someone walking an unexplored road, every step is data.

And for Shohei Ohtani, that uncertainty was not a burden.

It was part of the adventure.

Source

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

Kadokawa Special Edition: Shohei Ohtani Feature, p.185