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Baseball Primer Newsblog— The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand
Friday, February 29, 2008
Masato Yoshii, hired to be the new pitching coach for the Nippon Ham Fighters, has the Bobby Valentine seal of approval.
[Yoshii] is the first of the 31 Japanese players who have played in the major leagues since Hideo Nomo made his debut in 1995 with the Los Angeles Dodgers to return to Japan and become a coach.
Now that Japanese players have appeared at every position in Major League Baseball, the intrigue over whether Japanese players can make the transition is over. The six Japanese players in their first major league training camps this season represent the new status quo.
But Yoshii, 42, would not mind beginning a new trend.
“I’d like to think coaching in Japan is an important learning experience that could lead to a coaching opportunity in M.L.B.,” he said recently in an interview that was conducted in Japanese and took place after a coaches’ meeting at the Fighters’ Okinawa camp. “My English still stinks, so that’s something I need to work on, but as I improve that, it would be great to take my experiences as a coach here and apply it to coaching in America. That’s my plan.”
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Okay, starting pitcher: Nomo, Matsuzaka, many others.
Middle relief: Hasegawa, Ohtsuka, Okajima et al.
Closers: Chiefly Sasaki, with Ohtsuka, Saito and Takatsu.
Catcher: Johjima
1st Base: Nakamura had 4 games here, so I guess he counts.
2nd Base: Iguchi, K. Matsui
3rd Base: Iwamura, Nakamura
Shortstop: K. Matsui
Left Field: H. Matsui, Taguchi
Center Field: Ichiro, Shinjo, Taguchi
Right Field: Ichiro, Taguchi, and soon Fukudome.
Designated Hitter: Ichiro, H. Matsui
Bench: Taguchi, Shinjo
First base was really bugging me, but I guess Nakamura qualifies. I wonder when we'll see a regular starting Japanese first baseman. We're also still waiting for the first real Japanese utility infielder. Kazuo Matsui hasn't played 1st or 3rd...
Yoshii's a riot. On one program here in Japan, he said that Orel Hershiser gave him this advice: "You're Asian, which means people think you're mysterious. You should make that work for you on the mound." So Yoshii began telling people he was a ninja.
He started Game 5 of the 1999 NLCS and gave them three good innings. I'll always remember him for that quote.
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