Shohei Ohtani learned the extent of his injury between games of a day-night doubleheader Wednesday. What criss-crossed around him was despair. Devastation. Despondency. 

Ohtani heard maybe a half-hour before the start of Game 2 that he had a tear in the ulnar collateral ligament of his pitching elbow.

His Angels manager, Phil Nevin, already had fashioned a lineup without his biggest star. 

But Ohtani lobbied to play because, well, it is what he does. There is an eat, sleep, play baseball element to his life. So Nevin was informed by his bosses that Ohtani would be in the lineup and still the skipper wanted to be sure.

So he asked Ohtani if he was certain he wanted to play and Ohtani joked, “Yes, shortstop.” 

He was — to those who were watching — not in despair or devastation or despondency.

Ohtani is a human lab experiment of his own concoction to see just what obsessive focus and inexplicable skills could accomplish.

So if he no longer could complete the greatest two-way season in history — topping his efforts from the two previous seasons — well, there were still mountains to ascend; challenges to face. 

To finish off a second AL MVP — though that seems a foregone conclusion if he never threw another pitch or took another swing this season.

To try to remove Aaron Judge from the record books for single-season homers by an AL player after one year.

To see if he could produce a Triple Crown. 

So Ohtani was batting second as the designated hitter Friday night at Citi Field and the plan — for now — appears to be that he will continue to hold that position for the rest of the year.

The Angels were not saying the degree of Ohtani’s tear or if he was definitely facing a second Tommy John surgery, explaining those were questions for Ohtani, who — if you don’t know — notoriously avoids much chit-chat with reporters except after he pitches, which he will not be doing the rest of this season (and maybe all of next year). 

So it was left up to those around him to offer insights. What resonated was their sense of Ohtani moving without much emotion from two-way player to only hitting.

How it fit his psyche. Ohtani is superb at compartmentalizing.

Ignoring the expectations of others and what is viewed as possible in the game. 

It is why the sentiment was, doh, of course, Ohtani is going to continue his efforts to be a two-way player, even if he has to table pitching all of next season.

Mike Trout said, “No doubt in my mind.” Because Ohtani has never shown any doubt in his mind that he can do this. 

That the biggest star in the game will not be able to do this for another long stretch of time is, as Trout said, “Tough for him. Tough for the team, obviously for the fans. For just baseball.” 

Ohtani underwent Tommy John surgery in October 2018 and did not pitch in 2019 and for most of 2020. But from 2021 through Wednesday night, he had authored the greatest singular baseball performance in history due to his duality. 

And that is the sadness now. Whether you fell asleep to the late-night news Wednesday or woke up to it Thursday, there were two immediate responses — one economical, one emotional. 

Financially, Ohtani was on the brink of the most fascinating — and lucrative — free agency in history. With each passing month of two-way genius, it felt like another $100 million was being added — $400 million, $500 million, $600 million, more.

Even with the injury, Ohtani is not exactly going to have to tin cup this. 

He has such great worth as just a hitter and in providing monetary streams to wherever he goes, that he is going to still probably score a record contract in both total (above Trout’s $426.5 million) and average value (above the $43.67 million of Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander). 

So what lingers is the sadness. Because what he was doing was so unique. It was pushing what we believed possible for a player.

He will still be a phenom — especially if he goes on another homer tear and begins to track down Judge. 

But Beyonce is on tour and you wouldn’t want to find out that she is just going to be singing, but no longer dancing — no matter how terrific a singer she is. 

The warranty for what Ohtani has been doing always has hovered around him, just because we see the carnage delivered for individual hitters and especially individual pitchers; and here was the no-breaks and no-brakes for what one person was doing — plus running about as fast as anyone in the game.

Yet, he kept making us change our minds on what one player could do. And that is now at least on hiatus. 

Ohtani is not going to play shortstop. He is not going to pitch. He is going to keep trying to hit. That is something. But it is now Beyonce just singing. Once you have seen the whole show, well, sadness.