6 Responses to “Japanese Born Pitchers Who Played In MLB”

1. Mark Says:
   November 8th, 2010 at 3:32 pm

   I'm all for having Japanese players in the MLB. They have a good system in Japan. I remember when Kazuhiro Sasaki came in with Seattle and how hard the drop was on his fastball was. I loved watching him pitch!

2. Steve Lombardi Says:
   November 8th, 2010 at 3:50 pm

   It does seem like the RP imports have done better than the SP imports. I wonder if that's because there's more rest between starts in Japan?

3. DoubleDiamond Says:
   November 8th, 2010 at 8:19 pm

   Seeing the names Steve Randolph, Craig House, and Jeff McCurry on this list makes me wonder if they were born in Japan to American parents because one parent (or even both) was in the service or was otherwise only there temporarily, especially if these guys basically grew up in the U.S. (or a combination of the U.S. and other countries as military "brats").

   Over the years, I've tended to break down foreign born players into three categories:

   1. Players who were born and raised in a foreign country to parents who were from that country, who did all or most of their baseball development there. Examples would be a great deal of the players from the Caribbean and Latin America.

   2. Players who were born in a foreign country to parents who were from that country but came to the U.S. to live while still young enough to do all or most of their baseball development here. Examples would be sons of European immigrants in the 1800s and the first half of the 1900s (including the recently deceased Bobby Thomson from Scotland) and the sons of immigrants from the Caribbean and Latin America in recent years (including Jose Canseco from Cuba).

   3. Players with at least one American parent who were born in a foreign country during a time when their parents were temporarily living there, usually due to military service, who then returned to the U.S. to do all or most of their baseball development here. Examples would be Giants manager Bruce Bochy and former Phillies shortstop Steve Jeltz, both of whom were born in France while a parent was stationed their in the service.

   One thing I have noticed over the years is that very few Asian Americans have become major leaguers, and most that have are from Hawaii.

4. Jeff Wise Says:
   November 9th, 2010 at 10:52 am

   I loved watching Kazuhiro Sasaki pitch for the Mariners! He had a split that totally dropped out of the zone at the last second. He pitched very well for them and I was sorry to see him go.

   He pitched very well in the playoffs except for that 2001 ALCS game against the Yankees.

5. TheGoof Says:
   November 9th, 2010 at 11:36 pm

   Two things...
   1) A few years ago I noticed that most Japanese pitchers (and, I think, Korean too) seemed to have an immediate effect, but after two or three years become useless or a shell of themselves.

   2) Unless I missed somebody, particularly this year, no Japanese player has played more than a handful of games at 1B. Not a single Win Share, I think.

6. Johnny Twisto Says:
   November 10th, 2010 at 2:35 pm

   Ishikawa on the Giants plays first.

   .....aaaand I just looked him up and see he's American. Never mind.

   Per the PI, Norihiro Nakamura is the only Japanese to play 1B, 15 innings for the Dodgers in 2005.