ORLANDO, Fla. — Jerry Dipoto didn’t look like someone who had spent 24 hours in an unresponsive fetal position too distressed and disappointed to move. His words didn’t come through gritted teeth or obvious forced sentiment. There was no jilted scorn or melancholy regret in his voice.
Nope, the Mariners’ general manager was the same energetic guy who had been filled with optimism and hope in the days and weeks before hitting-and-pitching sensation Shohei Ohtani signed with Los Angeles Angels — Dipoto’s former employer — on Friday.
With the majority of the baseball world descending on the Swan & Dolphin Resort in Walt Disney World for the Major League Baseball winter meetings, the bulk of the conversations in the lobby, and of course the lobby bar, centered on two topics — Ohtani’s somewhat surprising decision to sign with the Angels and the Yankees’ acquisition of Giancarlo Stanton.