How Scott Rationalized Dragging Us Out Of the Wilderness

For much of the trip (and for a few weeks before it), we’d been debating about trying to catch the Red Sox when they were at Safeco Field to play the Mariners. The most likely game would be one on Wednesday afternoon. When Scott checked the schedule a few days back and saw it would be Daisuke Matsuzaka pitching for Boston, he realized tickets might be hard to come by. For the non-baseball fans reading this, following is as brief a summary as he can make it on why this would be.

Although baseball is known as ‘America’s national pastime,’ television ratings suggest heavily that it has been supplanted in popularity by football on a regular basis, and ‘large event’ sports affairs – like the Final Four in college basketball and the Masters in golf – regularly have more viewers than baseball’s World Series. In the rest of the world, baseball is mostly an afterthought to soccer and other sports. One major exception to this is Japan. Japan has a thriving professional baseball scene. Experts who’ve been involved with both Major League Baseball and its Japanese counterpart say that overall the level of play in Japan is equivalent to between AAA ball here (our top minor league) and the majors.

Unlike many Latin American countries which don’t have great baseball leagues and essentially export their best players to the U.S. (David Ortiz and Pedro Martinez are but two popular examples) most Japanese players have stayed in Japan. Only recently have a small handful of players decided to test their abilities against what many believe to be the best competition in the world here in the U.S. (though it should be noted that Japan did win the inaugural World Baseball Classic – equivalent to The World Cup in soccer – last year so they must be doing something pretty well). One of the first high profile players to hop the Pacific was Ichiro Suzuki, the centerfielder for the Seattle Mariners. Since his arrival here several years ago he has consistently been one of the better players in the league. He hits for a very high batting average (he was hitting .362 during Wednesday’s game which puts him second in the American League), is known as a base running threat, and his speed allows him to track down more fly balls than most in the outfield.

He has found a welcoming home here in Seattle, a Pacific Rim community where Japanese translations of English storefront signs are not uncommon. In fact, the Mariners are majority owned by Nintendo, a Japanese company and one of the world’s leading video game makers.

Ichiro, as he is universally known, and his success paved the way for many of the Japanese players who have followed, none of whom have been as heralded as Daisuke Matsuzaka, the pitcher the Red Sox signed to a much ballyhooed contract this past off season.

Matsuzaka achieved rock star status in Japan, his fame beginning in 1998 when he was still a high schooler. He was named the rookie of the year in 1999 his first professional season in Japan and the MVP of last year’s World Baseball Classic. It is said that when he pitched in Japan, people would gather outside electronics stores to watch the game. In short, he is Elvis.

Because of the popularity of baseball in Japan generally, and of certain players in particular, the higher profile players in the U.S. often have their own contingent of Japanese media who do nothing but cover their exploits for the fans back home.

The Mariners played at Fenway earlier this season. Due to the highly anticipated match up of Matzusaka and Ichiro, about 120 media credentials for these games were issued to Japanese media alone.

Wednesday’s game would mark the first time Matzusaka and Ichiro would square off in Seattle. Think Elvis and The Beatles on the same ticket. First in Nashville then in Liverpool.