Shohei Ohtani is the biggest story in sports this week, this month, and if things continue, it would not be a stretch to say this century.

Shohei Ohtani? The Japanese Babe Ruth.

If Ruth could run like Carl Lewis.

A week does not make a career, but good Lord. Ohtani made his second major league start yesterday, and took a perfect game into the 7th inning. In seven complete he had 12 strikeouts with one walk and one hit. This was his second win of the young season, his first coming last Sunday when he yielded a pedestrian three hits and three runs over six innings.

Did I mention he hit three home runs this week moonlighting as a designated hitter?

This is not real.

Pitching I could see. New guy in a new league could fool batters a couple times around. But hitting .389 with three home runs? That’s no fluke. That’s no gimmick.

Hitting a baseball, in addition to being the most difficult thing in sports, is also one of the most honest.

It’s a week; I get it. Cooperstown is still a ways off. But Ohtani’s achievements can be described only as Ruthian.

“Like finding out Beethoven and Cezanne were the same person,” Daniel Okrent once said to describe Ruth’s hitting and pitching skills.

And was Emperor.