Shohei Ohtani, Munetaka Murakami Headline Rivalry Weekend Recap Program

Ohtani, Murakami, Schlittler Star in Rivalry Weekend Recap Program

This week in Diamond Dynasty was supposed to be a quiet one after last Friday's introduction of the Mural Series, with a Showdown adding a new ace pitcher — if Kevin Gausman counts — to the mode while little else of consequence came to pass. But with grumblings on social media in the MLB The Show community building, San Diego Studio has zagged instead, dropping a new Rivalry Weekend Recap Program that has three crown jewels of Major League Baseball as its final rewards: White Sox slugger Munetaka Murakami, Yankees ace Cam Schlittler, and Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani.

And best of all: They're free. Or "free," depending on your definition of the term.

In Diamond Dynasty, though, it's fair to say a free Shohei Ohtani that doesn't require anything but completion of a Program XP reward path is as "free" as things get, and this one — a 94 OVR card that comes in as a designated hitter with secondary eligibility in right field but cannot pitch — is unequivocally that even if it maybe isn't the world-destroying slugger than some Ohtanis have been in DD. In fact, with his only visible stats at or above the 94 OVR the card bears being 96 Batting Clutch and 99 Arm Strength — which, yes, is probably fair for a hurler who routinely touches triple digits, though also speculative, as the real-life Ohtani has never played an inning in the outfield in MLB play and is many years removed from doing so in Japan — there's a good chance this is the most underwhelming Ohtani that has ever been part of the card-collecting mode.

It is also still a Shohei Ohtani card, and has no batting stat lower than 85 save the largely unimportant Vision, and it reflects the man himself finally breaking through on offense in 2026, recording five RBI in a defeat of the Angels, his former team and now crosstown rivals over the weekend. While Ohtani has been every bit an ace for the Dodgers — he is currently leading the majors with a 0.82 ERA and well on his way to contending for has Cy Young — his struggles at the plate, especially while also pitching, have been well-documented, and those five RBI against the Angels are a fifth of his seasonal total.

So seizing on an offensive explosion — in the sense that five runs batted in would be for most players not considered among the greatest to ever play — to honor Ohtani with a card that can hit but not pitch is an exceedingly clever way of delivering a free Ohtani to Diamond Dynasty players without giving the best Ohtani(s) to everyone.

And given that the Program itself is more than just Ohtani, with Murakami arguably being a better hitter for the MLB The Show 26 metagame thanks to his titanic 110/101 Power splits and Schlittler having a five-pitch mix that has 99 MPH heat at the top and four breaking pitches with plenty of oomph to compliment it, this is surely a win for players.

How to Get Your Free 94 OVR Shohei Ohtani

Okay, now that that phrase is in here for SEO purposes: The 94 OVR Ohtani is free with sweat equity, but does require either significant Moments or Missions progress.

The Rivalry Weekend Program's 10 standard Moments all reward three Stars for XP reward path progress for various basic recreations of Rivalry Weekend happenings, including the efforts of all of Schlittler, Murakami, and Ohtani. There is also an Extreme-level Moment here, which tasks players with hitting six home runs over the course of a game on All-Star to match the Guardians' onslaught of long balls against the Reds, but it only awards 10 more Stars, leaving players who do both the standard and Extreme Moments 10 Stars short of the 50 needed for Ohtani.

That's where the Missions come in. Five Stars are on offer for each of five Stat Missions:

• Three home runs with catchers
• Three home runs with left fielders
• Three home runes with first basemen
• Nine strikeouts with Yankees pitchers
• Five extra-base hits with Dodgers players

And then a total of 16 more Stars are available via the Parallel XP Missions tied to the Program:

• 2,000 Parallel XP with Topps Now Series players (three Stars)
• 4,000 Parallel XP with Topps Now Series players (three Stars)
• 1,000 Parallel XP with Rivalry Weekend Program Topps Now Series players Edgar Quero, Tyrone Taylor, Murakami, and Schlittler (five Stars)
• 10,000 Parallel XP with Topps Now Series players (five Stars)

The design of this Program means that players cannot fully complete it and obtain Ohtani without completing a mixture of Moments and Missions.

But a lot of the Moments are of the quick-and-easy variety: Three ask for a homer in a single plate appearance, two more require two hits and one homer, and the only slightly slower pitching Moment asks to strike out the side with Schlittler. Getting 12 Stars from four Moments — or 10 from the Extreme one — to nab Quero, the first player on the XP reward path, enables obtaining all 50 Stars without any other Moments, but three Moments and any other Stat or PXP Mission also obtains Quero and enables the same.

Regardless, the minimum of three Moments and full completion of the Missions is probably the swiftest path to full XP reward path completion, and the latter requiring homers probably means that a nine-inning game on Rookie against a hapless CPU or a homer-fest in the Moonshot Event are equally useful ways to hammer the long balls necessary to get those stats.

What Does a Free Ohtani Mean for Diamond Dynasty?

Of course, adding a new free Shohei Ohtani to Diamond Dynasty — or, to put it in plainer terms, giving everyone willing to spend a few hours grinding a free unicorn — will have a few ramifications in the metagame. The first and most obvious is that everyone is about to run Ohtani at least once or twice in their lineups, as this card reshapes the competition to be the best right fielder and designated hitter in DD. I don't think this Ohtani is actually atop either of those lists, as he lacks the ability to switch-hit that is so coveted in a metagame that revolves around combatting PCI shrinkage — whether actually or mentally — and also won't be a top-tier defender at a critical position thanks to his average reactions and despite his cannon arm, but he's also obviously among the best options in both cases.

But he's also not an Ohtani who pitches, and that exile from the mound is largely why this card is unlikely to meaningfully dent the price of the Live Series Ohtani — currently around 750,000 Stubs — immediately or even eventually. While this free or "free" Ohtani is better than the Live Series card as a Contact hitter and has right field eligibility, it simply does not function the same way the Live Series card does in Collections and is arguably thoroughly inferior to an Ohtani that can both pitch and hit, as those are extremely valuable in conjunction with each other. (Using Ohtani as a pitcher and designated hitter allows for rapid accrual of Parallel XP to boost him, for one; a two-way player pitching and DHing also opens up bench construction considerably.)

And if you want the "best" Ohtani in Diamond Dynasty or the most representative one, you should still clearly prefer the Live Series — or any eventual pitching Ohtani — version to this one, for versatility or the Live Series card's Power or an Ohtani who can mow down batters like the arguable best pitcher in baseball at the moment is actually doing in reality.

This card is not that. It is still very good — and free — and well worth having. But trying to squint and make it something it is not rather than appreciating what it is will only lead to disappointment — a lesson that could perhaps be applied very judiciously to Diamond Dynasty as a whole.