A Lionsgate TV project about the gambling scandal surrounding Ippei Mizuhara, the former translator for Los Angeles Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani, has found a home.
Starz is developing the drama, which will center on Mizuhara, who in March 2024 was fired by the Dodgers after Ohtani’s representatives accused him of stealing millions of dollars from the four-time MVP to pay off gambling debts. Alex Convery (Air) is set to serve as showrunner and writer. Justin Lin (the Fast and Furious franchise, SWAT) is attached to direct and will co-write the story. Convery and Lin will executive produce with Scott Delman; sportswriter Albert Chen is a co-exec producer.
Lionsgate TV has been working on the project since April 2024, with Delman and Chen shepherding it throughout. Convery and Lin came aboard later in the process.
Lionsgate is the former parent company of Starz; the two formally separated earlier this year, with Starz becoming a standalone, publicly traded company.
The logline for the Mizuhara drama says the potential series will tell “the inside story of Shohei Ohtani’s translator Ippei Mizuhara, who journeys from unemployed drifter to international icon only to find himself tangled in a gambling scandal that rocked the sports world.” Mizuhara pleaded guilty to charges of bank fraud and tax evasion in June 2024 and was sentenced to nearly five years in prison. Ohtani was not implicated in the gambling allegations.
Convery has made sports stories a specialty. In addition to Air, the 2023 film about Nike’s courting of a young Michael Jordan, Convery is set to write the screenplay for The Tiger Slam, about Tiger Woods’ run of winning four consecutive major golf tournaments in 2000 and 2001. He is repped by UTA, Untitled Entertainment and Yorn Levine.
Lin recently signed on to helm a film adaptation of the Helldivers video game at Sony and is set to direct Brzrkr, an adaptation of a comic book created by Keanu Reeves and Matt Kindt. He is repped by CAA and Sloane Offer.
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