Trevor Bauer Believes Only Shohei Ohtani Is More Popular Than Him And Only 20 Hitters On Earth Could Touch Him

Former MLB pitcher Trevor Bauer went off on X (née Twitter) this week with an axe to grind about his global popularity and how his skills on the mound are still as good if not better than anyone. In a series of posts, Bauer claimed that on a global scale he is second in popularity only to Shohei Ohtani and that if he was on the mound for an MLB team there are realistically only 20 batters in the league that might give him a challenge.

Because there is no straight-forward way to compare global popularity for two pitchers, I thought to look at Google Trends and compare Trevor Bauer to other MLB stars.

In Trevor’s defense, he is quite popular (according to Google) on the global scale. In all likelihood he is in the top 10 most ‘popular’ MLB players in the past few years and certainly top 5 among pitchers in terms of popularity. However, in this instance ‘popular’ equates to interest on Google which reflects the headlines Bauer has been associated with since he last pitched for the Dodgers on June 28, 2021 before being replaced on administrative leave leading to what Trevor believes is being ‘blackballed’ from the league.

Here, Bauer claims he isn’t just the second most popular pitcher on earth but also claims he is the most knowledgeable pitcher alive today. He also reiterates that he’s willing to pitch for free:

His claims didn’t stop there. Trevor Bauer believes there are only 20 hitters that would make him sweat:

The video of an alleged teenager hitting a bomb off Trevor Bauer, albeit a video that was disputed by some for not being what it claimed to be, suggests that there are more than 20 batters who might be able to get the best of Trevor.

How Popular Is Trevor Bauer Compared To Other MLB Stars?

Despite not pitching in Major League Baseball since June 2021, Trevor does remain incredibly ‘popular’ by measurable standards. That is to say, his name remains in the news and there is chatter about him. Here is how he compares to Shohei Ohtani:

Comparing Bauer to other pitchers, at least on Google Trends, supports his claim of popularity. Here is Trevor compard to Jacob DeGrom:

Here’s Bauer vs Gerrit Cole:

And lastly, Trevor Bauer’s popularity versus Paul Skenes. As you can see, Skenes has certainly outpaced Trevor in popularity over the past year and change:

After that, when comparing Trevor to other MLB stars on Google Trends the lines are either pretty flat or Trevor is more popular, at least from the 10 or so I plugged in. Again though, this is a measure of how much he is in the news and given Trevor’s legal battles and alleged blackballing from the MLB, all news wasn’t good news for him for several years. His claim that he’s the 2nd most popular pitcher today might hold some weight, at least more so than the people replying on X might think.