Kansas City Royals first baseman Vinnie Pasquantino is quickly becoming one of Major League Baseball’s most well-liked personalities away from the field.
After an excellent season on the diamond, in which Pasquantino led the Royals in home runs (32) and RBIs (113), the so-called “Pasquatch” was chosen to be a player correspondent for the World Series this week between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Toronto Blue Jays.
In advance of Game 1, which takes place on Friday night in Toronto, Pasquantino not only conducted a quick interview with the most famous player on earth, but got laughs out of everyone in attendance.
The two fastest pitches Shohei Ohtani has ever thrown were both to Vinnie Pasquantino … two years apart.
Naturally, Vinnie had to find out why. pic.twitter.com/EUyTvtw8OW
— MLB (@MLB) October 23, 2025
Astute Royals fans may recall how in June, Shohei Ohtani delivered a 101.7-mph fastball to Pasquantino at Kauffman Stadium, resulting in a 4-6-3 double play. It was the fastest pitch of Ohtani’s major league career, but at the 2023 World Baseball Classic, Ohtani threw 102.0 mph to… Pasquantino.
So the Royals’ fan-favorite slugger had just one question for Ohtani: “Why do you throw so hard to me? Why? Why do you hate me?”
“You’re just a really good hitter. I have to,” Ohtani responded with a laugh, via his interpreter, Will Ireton.
“That’s not good enough,” Pasquantino insisted, as the crowd of reporters surrounding Ohtani’s table at media day continued chuckling. “You throw too hard, Shohei.”
Pasquantino just had his best season yet on the baseball field, and fortunately for the Royals, he’s under team control for three more seasons. But even non-Royals fans are beginning to appreciate his antics, be they on camera or on social media.
The 27-year-old first baseman has over 48,200 followers on X (formerly Twitter) as of Friday afternoon. And he posted that he has two free tickets to give away to Friday night’s game, so that number could be going up as you read this sentence.
According to MLB, Pasquantino will provide behind-the-scenes access for Game 1, capturing all the action on Friday via social media, in addition to appearances on MLB Network.
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‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.si.com ’
