When the team and the length and the dollar figures from the looming Shohei Ohtani sweepstakes settle into place, and if the winner is some franchise other than the Angels, what if after what if will start to emerge.

There’ll be dissections about how the Angels handled one of the sport’s greatest hitters and pitchers — the greatest in 100 years at combining both — for six seasons.

There’ll be analysis of how managers Mike Scioscia, Brad Ausmus, Joe Maddon and Phil Nevin, as well as general managers Billy Eppler and Perry Minasian, built around this championship window, and then puzzling conclusions about how each year’s quest found some strange way to fall short.

This all certainly changes if Ohtani returns from his pitching-hand blister, Mike Trout returns in a month or two from surgery to repair a fracture of the hamate bone in his left hand, Anthony Rendon returns from his shin contusion, the Angels find a way to remain healthy and make a magical postseason run filled with the magical moments that the sport’s greatest players are supposed to have.