Kazuma Okamoto, centre, the Toronto Blue Jays’ newest signing, dons a jersey at an introductory press conference with his agent Scott Boras, left, and Blue Jays general manager Ross Atkins at Rogers Centre in Toronto on Tuesday.Jon Blacker/The Canadian Press
Midway through his debut press conference at Rogers Centre, someone finally thought to ask Kazuma Okamoto’s translator why he was laughing so much. On the face of it, Okamoto’s answers weren’t funny. They were just barely answers.
“He just has a very interesting personality,” the translator said, giggling.
He kept laughing. Okamoto’s answers remained straight, as well as much longer than they ended up becoming in English. Somewhere, Sofia Coppola is looking into a copyright violation.
I’ve been to some car-crash pressers when it comes to the Toronto Blue Jays, but this was a new kind – a fun one. On paper, Okamoto, 29, isn’t a superstar. But in the room, he has that sort of energy. It’s what they used to call a quiet confidence, and which they now call the good sense not to say too much on the record.
Okamoto may be the first Toronto athlete since Syl Apps to show up to a formal engagement that isn’t a funeral in a suit and tie. He opened with a statement in English – clearly memorized – which he ended with, “Go Blue Jays!” and a delighted smile. Delighted with himself, mostly. Then he took about 10 minutes to carefully do up every button on his new jersey.
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Okamoto has yet to swing a baseball bat in this country, and I wouldn’t be shocked if he’s already Canada’s favourite baseball player.
Flanking Okamoto at the dais were his new boss, Jays GM Ross Atkins, and his other boss, super-agent Scott Boras.
I’m not sure why you’d bring your agent to an introductory press conference. Maybe Boras didn’t ask, and Okamoto assumed it was a North American thing when he showed up driving the cab.
Boras spent a lot of the encounter sighing through questions about the World Baseball Classic, each one of them another missed opportunity to talk about Scott Boras.
Okamoto, right, alongside Boras at Rogers Centre on Tuesday at his introductory press conference.Cole Burston/Getty Images
When someone finally did ask him a question, Boras launched into a monologue that went on longer than all of Okamoto’s answers strung together.
You’ll be interested to know that the California-based Boras saw the baseball potential in Toronto “20 years ago.” That would be 10-plus years after the city had won two World Series and set the single-season attendance record. Get a load of Kreskin over here.
Atkins, who has a real way with a non-sequitur, wasn’t called on much. But he rose to the occasion when summoned to do so.
To a question about whether Okamoto will receive “support” from the Blue Jays – “It starts with support, and that’s where it ends.”
When a Japanese reporter pointed out that the Jays missed out on other free agents from that country, like Shohei Ohtani and Roki Sasaki, Atkins jumped in: “You forgot Shun Yamaguchi.”
Yamaguchi was the last player the Jays signed direct from Japan, and a total disaster on the field. Everyone had forgotten him. Until right then.
In years past, this sort of rhetorical slapstick created a pathetic effect. The Jays couldn’t do it on the field, and they couldn’t do it at the podium either.
But given the team’s change of circumstances, the same sort of thing becomes endearing. The Jays aren’t slick like the Dodgers or steeped in reverent nostalgia like the Yankees. They are their own thing. A bit bumptious, sure, but capable not just of seeing the comedy inherent in professional sport, but of being that comedy. It’s all very Canadian. Just a bit off.
Okamoto is clearly a different sort of cat as well. For one thing, he promised repeatedly to work very hard, doing whatever the Jays ask of him. You get the feeling that if someone told him to paint the locker room, Okamoto would be standing outside Rogers Centre the next morning holding a ladder.
Okamoto shows his No. 7 jersey to media in Toronto on Tuesday with his agent, Boras, in the background. Okamoto had his translator laughing through the event with the answers he provided in Japanese.Nick Turchiaro/Reuters
When he was asked the most obvious question – Why Toronto? – he said that he’d shown the logos of all the teams in Major League Baseball to his daughter, and asked her which one she liked best. She picked the Jays.
Was this serious? Impossible to tell. Okamoto said it straight-facedly, staring fixedly at a random point at the back of the room. The translator found it hilarious. None of the Japanese reporters on hand laughed, though. The rest of us side-eyed each other. Was this the lede or was the guy pulling our leg?
If that really was how this happened, I suppose it (plus 60-million U.S. dollars) isn’t the worst reason to move countries. Plus, let’s face it – the Jays are a thing now. People want in.
The lesson of the 2025 MLB playoffs wasn’t that people, players included, like teams that are good. It was that people, players included again, love teams that are fun.
Fun transcends winning. This is not to say that fans prefer a fun loser (though that can be true). But that they are more attached to, and more tolerant of a team that projects joy, even in defeat.
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The Jays were always going to be a good team next year with the personnel they ended the season under contract with. But there was no guarantee they would continue to be fun. Fun is ephemeral. Fun can vanish in an instant.
On this level alone, the Okamoto signing is a winner. You could not watch this Mutt, Mutt, Mutt and Jeff routine and not come away charmed.
On a baseball level, this may be it. The Jays have become every media rumour paddler’s favourite club – everything you throw at them sticks. They’re in on Bo Bichette. They’re in on Kyle Tucker. They’re in on Nuke LaLoosh.
After four notable free-agent signings (Okamoto, plus pitchers Dylan Cease, Cody Ponce and Tyler Rogers), Atkins has begun moving into expectation management: “Additions at this point will start to cut away at playing time from players we feel are very good major-league pieces.”
Maybe he means it. Maybe that’s gamesmanship.
Whatever the case, it feels hopeful that however exactly the Jays end up looking in spring training, they have maintained some of their lovable, postseason weirdness. It’s even possible they may be weirder.
Amidst the dreary, lockstep, hive-mind of sports these days, weird is good.
Editor’s note: The lead photo in this article was incorrectly captioned. It has been updated to identify Scott Boras as Kazuma Okamoto’s agent.