Cathy handed me her phone and said, “Watch this.”

It was a highlight (if you want to watch it start @ the 1:10 mark) from a recent Dodgers/Padres game, and Shohei Ohtani had just been hit by a pitch—up and in, the kind of pitch that could’ve easily tagged his head or face. Instead, he turned his body just in time and took it in the shoulder.

That pitch was dangerous, and in today’s baseball climate, it wasn’t an isolated incident. Between their last two series, the Padres and Dodgers had hit 10 batters. Baseball has an unwritten rule: you hit our guy, we’ll hit yours. What often follows is predictable, benches clear, tempers flare, and fists sometimes fly.

In that moment, Ohtani had choices:

  • He could’ve yelled, charged the mound, escalated.

  • He could’ve made sure his pitcher got “even” the next inning.

But he didn’t.

Instead, Ohtani turned to his own dugout, where teammates were already on the top step, ready to rumble in his defense and he waved them off. He told them to stay put. Then he walked toward the Padres dugout with a calm smile and shook hands with an opposing player. He chose to de-escalate. He let go of the rope.

I turned to Cathy and said, “That was incredible.”

“Why?” she asked.

“Because guys don’t do that,” I replied.

And I meant it.

As a lifelong baseball fan, I’ve seen hundreds of these moments and almost every time, anger wins. Retaliation wins. There’s this idea that to protect your team, your ego, or your manhood, you’ve got to fight back. Hurt them before they hurt you again.

But Ohtani showed us there’s another way.

In my office, I keep a sketch of a man in a tug-of-war, but he’s letting go of the rope. Not losing, but choosing. Because you can’t keep pulling if one side refuses to grip.

This is what I share with men in coaching sessions or MenLiving meetings when conflict with a partner or loved one comes up: You can let go of the rope. You don’t have to play the game of escalation, who’s right and who’s tougher. That game has no winner. (Middle East conflict, anyone?)

What Ohtani did flies in the face of the Man Box, that narrow set of rules that tells men we must be dominant, emotionless, aggressive. That the only response to vulnerability or threat is strength, control, and power. Ohtani broke that code and showed strength through restraint, leadership through calm, dignity through peace.

We need more of that. More men who realize that strength isn’t about pulling harder, but about demonstrating leadership through de-escalation and knowing when to let go.