A Complete Waste of Money May 10, 2008
Posted by njsportstalk in Baseball.trackback
Kei Igawa, Kazuo Matsui, Hideki Irabu, Hideki Matsui. Alright so New York teams are 1 for 4 on Japenese Players. The other three? Yikes. It all started when the Yankees brought over Irabu (SP) before the 1997 season. The Yankees did win two world series during his three year tenure, no thanks to Irabu. In his MLB career he pitched in 126 games, throwing 514 innings, going 34-35, with 16 saves 405 strikeouts and a 5.15 ERA. Not pretty. Even after that terrible signing, the Yankees signed OF Hideki Matsui before the 2003 season. Godzilla was the only signing that has come even remotely near a success. In his 5 1/2 seasons with the Yankees, Hideki has batted .296 with 107 hrs 479 rbis in 715 games. He has been a solid contributor for the Yankees.
One year following the Yankees signing of Hideki Matsui, the Mets signed Kazuo Matsui (SS-2B). His tenure was a disaster. In his three seasons with the Mets, he played in just 239 games. Over his career he has batted .272 with 18 hrs 142 rbis 68 sbs in 396 games. Then came another huge disaster. The Yankees posted 26 million dollars for SP Kei Igawa and then signed him to a 5 year-20 million dollar contract. So they basically threw 46 million into the Hudson River. In his 15 appearances (13 starts) with the Yankees he has a 6.75 era. That era probably gives him too much credit. Kei Igawa has been nothing short of awful.
The Yankees have gone 1-2; the Mets 0-1. I think its safe to say that any Japense signing by a New York team will need to be a home run. Although in Triple A-Japan, can anyone really tell?
Dan
Triple A Japan did beat out USA, the DR, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, etc etc. To win the World Baseball classic. Careful calling it Triple A. AND I wish there was more debate on Sadaharu Oh’s 868 HR’s compared to Aaron and Ruther occurred more often. AND before debates go insane in 338 career at bats vs MLB pitching (the likes of Jerry Koosman, Jim Palmer and Tom Seaver) Oh hit 25 homeruns and had an slugging % of .524. That gives him a HR rate of 13.52 which compares favorably to Bonds 12.7 and Ruthers 11.8 and far out trumps Aarons 16.7. Granted, only a small sample size but still I don’t think you can sit there and call Japan Triple A. All things aside, if it weren’t for how sports are run by major corporations over seas, it would be a lot easier for the better Japanese players to come over in there prime 26-28 as opposed to post prime as man of them have. Ichiro would be well on his way to surpassing Rose’s mark of 4256 hits which I think will not be broken, but due to the contractual agreements in Japan he was unable to make his way over here at a young age.