My two cents on what happened over the last couple of days or weeks:
- Dodgers were Ohtani's main preference from Day 1. Dodgers are always one of the favourites to win the World Series, they've built a perennial contender, have a strong farm system and a very solid core of players such as Freeman, Betts, Smith, etc. Player development and the farm system were important to Ohtani where he was going to sign. He didn't want to experience what he did with the Angels again. Dodgers reduced payroll the past two seasons for this exact moment.
- Rogers wanted to go after Ohtani as mentioned to support their investments in all the renovations at the Rogers Centre. Ohtani would have created hype and buzz around the team. They would have sold more season tickets and corporate tickets for their new Infield Club guaranteed. As well as the other positives from signing Ohtani as discussed in this thread. So Rogers, after the disappointing finishes the past two seasons probably went to Shapiro and Atkins in October and gave them the green light to target and lure Ohtani to the Blue Jays.
- Shapiro/Atkins did their due diligence by making their pitch, giving Ohtani a tour of the facilities in Dunedin and talking about what they could do for Ohtani and his brand. Blue Jays have been competitive over the last 3-4 seasons, have kept their rotation healthy and have shown a willingness to spend on FAs, which are all positives to show Ohtani that they are serious about contending.
- Ohtani liked what he heard from Shapiro/Atkins and strongly considered the Jays as an option. Blue Jays probably offered a deal around $600M over 10 years, and Ohtani likely would have accepted and was very close, but they wanted to give the Dodgers one last chance to beat that offer.
- Rumours circulate on Friday that Ohtani is flying to Toronto to meet the Blue Jays. Whether it was orchestrated by Ohtani's agent, we don't know. But that probably alarmed the Dodgers, which is why they called an emergency meeting Friday night.
- Dodgers realized the Blue Jays were to be taken seriously and rather than take the chance of losing Ohtani, they opened their wallets and offered $700 million to just end all of this drama. Ohtani's camp likely notified the Jays on Saturday morning and that number was too high for Rogers to meet.
- Ohtani's main preference was always the Dodgers. He was comfortable in the LA area and was impressed with their player development/farm system which were advantages for the Dodgers. Plus they managed to get the Dodgers to give him $75-100M more. Dodgers panicked last night with all the rumours about Ohtani flying to Toronto etc., so they went all in and wanted to seal the deal.