there's a whole new meaning now

50/50 has always meant "a 1 in 2 chance" or "could go either way" or "even split". there is a new meaning to 50/50 now, thanks to shohei ohtani who surpassed the half century mark in both home runs and stolen bases last thursday.  he joins jose canseco as a trailblazer - canseco recorded the first 40/40 season in 1988, a feat commemorated by topps in 2023 with this card

now, ohtani has created his own club for players with 50 homers and 50 steals. here's his 2024 bowman card (thanks kerry!)

i was able to watch most of the game, in fact i opened the mlb.tv app just after ohtani hit home run number 49. to see him add numbers 50 and 51 was pretty great. his 6 for 6 performance was easily one of the greatest individual offensive games in the history of baseball, and better than the one i saw in person - shawn green's 4 homer game - thanks to the rbi total and the two steals he recorded.

ohtani also passed green to become the dodgers' all-time single season home run leader. he is obviously the dodgers' first 50/50 player, and also their first 40/40 player. as you saw in last night's post, matt kemp narrowly missed hitting that mark in 2011. so, what the heck, here's a 2023 panini chronicles certified blue parallel of green

and a 2013 topps finest green refractor parallel of kemp

just to clear out a couple more cards from my scanned folder.

what an amazing season each of these guys had, but ohtani's is something new entirely!