sign in sign up
<<
Home , Don Nomura, Hideo Nomo, Japan Series, Koji Uehara, Masahiro Tanaka, Masanori Murakami

Images courtesy of Robert Klevens; www.prestigecollectibles.com

22 ans of Major League in the U.S. no longer blink when a talented Japanese player F arrives and makes an immediate impact on the game. is a record-setting, first-ballot Hall of Famer who became a fan favorite in Seattle. was a superb all-around player who helped the win the 2009 . is a lights-out who played a key role in the Red Sox World Series victory in 2013. and are young with immense talent and nasty . In all, a dozen Japanese players compete in the major leagues today. A mask featuring legendary star player and of , Tetsuharu Kawakami.

not for heavily restrictive free-agent rules in , there would undoubtedly be more. The long-held belief that Japanese players were less talented than their American counterparts has been supplanted by respect for the quality of Japanese baseball. And yet, some of the cultural aspects of the Japanese game remain entrenched. Like twins separated at birth, Japanese baseball and American baseball share many traits. Both emerged in the late 19th century in their respective countries — born in the U.S.A. and transplanted to Japan by American ed- ucators living in . Both gained popularity during a period of industrialization and urban growth. The game itself, mesmerizingly complex, graceful and replete with bursts of exciting action spaced between strategic and sometimes achingly slow intervals of inaction, held a tantalizing allure for fans in both countries. Played on open green fields under wide blue professional leagues emerged in the late 1800s, and skies, surrounded by grandstands baseball quickly became the national pastime, revered filled with cheering men, women in cities east of the Mississippi and populated with and children, baseball took on a players who became fan idols. Stars like , profundity that spurred deep al- Ty Cobb and Honus Wagner emerged as baseball legiances, impassioned excitement, prospered, and their worship became a foundational literary tributes and a hold on the element of the American game. The team mattered, players and the watchers that de- and winning was paramount, but the individual players fied simple explanations. had a unique stage on which to display their skills and The American love affair bask in success. Owners trying to cultivate fan interest with baseball has been well understood the attraction and influence of these star documented. Less well known is players and did everything to encourage their distinc- the Japanese obsession with the tive popularity. game, which many observers and Conversely, in Japan, the game, like the nation’s scholars point out is perfectly culture, embodied collectivism over individualism, and suited to a culture that has long discipline and loyalty instead of wealth and celebrity. praised baseball’s martial arts – In Japan, leagues didn’t appear like discipline, its selfless spirit until 1935. Until then, the game was confined to high and moral code, and its bright school and college teams and local industrial leagues. illumination of humility and According to Sayuri Guthrie Shimizu, a history dedication. professor at Rice University and author of “Transpacific The game and its basic tenets were Field of Dreams: How Baseball Linked the United States Above, th Suishu Tobita, the same, but at the end of the 19 and Japan in Peace and War,” Japanese collegiate teams a formative century, these two baseball ideologies began touring Hawaii and the U.S. mainland in the early manager in early took divergent paths. In America, 20th century. And because the Japanese game developed 20th-century Japan who became known as the “god “Baseball is more than just a game. It has eternal of Japanese value. Through it, one learns the beautiful and baseball.” noble spirit of Japan.” — Suishu Tobita

24 , the “Homerun King” of Japan.

as a school and company sport, “it was very firmly based on a regimented structure, and the emphasis was on the group accomplishment as opposed to individual stars.” Indeed, high school baseball, while an integral part of America’s game, is not remotely as popular as its Japanese counterpart. The annual Koshien high school obert Whiting, an American writer who has tournament, played each August before packed stadiums lived in Japan for much of the past four decades, of often weeping fans, has been described, in terms of has written extensively about Japanese baseball and has popularity, as a combination of the World Series and authored several books on the subject, including the the Super Bowl. While the games are being played, more 1989 best-seller “You Gotta Have Wa.” than 60 percent of Japan’s TV sets will be tuned in. Whiting’s insight into the Japanese game is widely When the pro leagues began, Japan had its stars, admired. In “You Gotta Have Wa,” he pointed out, “The but the philosophy and execution of the game bespoke United States and Japan have had a long relationship a vastly different cultural attitude. In Japan, the game marked by a clash of values: American individualism on came to mirror the national identity and moral phi- the one side, the Japanese focus on wa, or harmony, on losophy inextricably tied to Japan’s pride in itself. the other, as well as a contrasting work ethic.”

25 Over time, in a culture where the group supersedes the individual in so many aspects of life, Japanese baseball came to epitomize many tenets that the Japanese hold dear. In Japan, the saying goes, “the tallest nail gets hammered first,” and on a baseball diamond, there was little room or tolerance for the kind of individualism displayed by Americans like or . Selflessness, discipline, backbreaking hard work and practice, respect for the team and the manager, the deep belief in saving face — all are woven into the tapestry of Japanese baseball, even to this day. Given Japan’s geography and history, its cultural identity is tied to mores built upon centuries of isolation, homogeneity and a large population living in limited space. Japan, an archipelago made up of four main islands, is to 126 million people. But more than 80 percent of the archipelago is mountainous and un- inhabitable. So the population inhabits just 4 percent of the land area, which means a population density of 850 people per square mile, compared to 58 people per square mile in the U.S. Forced to live in congested urban areas, the Japanese long ago learned that harmony was based upon cooperation and conformity. Despite its isolation, Japan became adept at importing foreign culture after Commodore Perry pushed open the closed Japanese markets in 1854. In so doing, the nation was able to industrialize and adopt such foreign passions as baseball. In fact, Japanese collectivism may well have arisen from simple pragmatism. For example, a recent University of Virginia study published this year in Science found that people from rice- growing regions such as Japan “think in more interdependent and holistic ways than do those from wheat-growing areas.” According to the study, “it takes much more cooperation and overall effort to grow rice than wheat. To successfully plant and harvest rice, farmers must work together to build complex irrigation systems and set up labor exchanges. Over time, this need for teamwork fosters an interdependent and collectivist psychology. East Asian nations like Japan and South Korea have a long history of rice-growing, and their populations are more interdependent and less individualistic than those of other countries with comparable wealth.” According to Fred E. Jandt in “An Introduction to Intercul- tural Communications,” “The Japanese do not have the same perception of self as an individual that is typical in the United States; instead, the Japanese feel most comfortable with others who empathize. To be completely understood, people have to cooperate in the same context, and in doing so, there can be no differentiation of individuals. In such an extremely homo- geneous society, you are not seen as an individual, nor do you regard individualism as a positive trait.” If selflessness was born in the rice fields, it was on the baseball field that it came to be exemplified. While the cultural founda- tion of its people surely had some role in shaping Japanese base- ball and its team-first view, the game had its own philosopher/ managers who played a role in its development. According to Whiting, for example, post-war Japan and later the legendary Suishu Tobita helped crystallize such manager of the Yomiuri Giants, Japan’s thinking in Japanese baseball when he answer to the New York Yankees. Under became of the Kawakami, the Giants won 11 team in 1919. Tobita “believed that championships in 14 years, including nine players should love their teams in the in a row from 1965 to 1973. According way that one loved one’s hometown or to Whiting, Kawakami created a widely one’s country, that they should show The U.S. is a copied managerial philosophy called kanri total allegiance and obedience to their land where yakyu (controlled or managed baseball) that manager and that they should never, ever the stubborn combined Zen Buddhist principles with complain,” Whiting wrote. “He compared individualist Machiavellian tactics. baseball to Bushido, the way of the is honored As a manager, Kawakami took over Samurai in which only morally correct and where his players’ lives, on and off the field. He athletes could excel, and saw Zen ramifi- instructed players’ wives what to cook and cations in the sport.” “doing your feed their husbands and told them to shut Tobita himself said, “The purpose of own thing” off the TV sets in the evening so they would training is not health but the forging of is a motto of get enough sleep. the soul, and a strong soul is only born contemporary “In spring camp, he established a from strong practice. Student baseball society. taxing dawn-to-dusk regimen of practice, must be the baseball of self-discipline, or In Japan, including at its extreme 1,000-fungo trying to attain the truth, just as in Zen kojinshugi, drills, 100-fly drills and marathon runs,” Buddhism.” Whiting wrote. “It was an approach that In order to attain this truth, Japanese the term for was termed karada de oboeru (learn by baseball became known for its draconian individualism, the body) in Japanese, designed to teach work ethic. High school players must is almost a muscle memory through constant repeti- practice for hours every day, year round. dirty word. tion, but also to build fighting spirit by Not long ago, errors in a game were penal- — teaching players to reach and surpass ized with corporal punishment, and losing their physical limits.” teams would endure hours of exhausting post-game Kawakami believed in corporal punishment, and drills. Professional players arrive at in discourteous players were on the back and legs with late January and engage in intense drills from dawn to bamboo sticks. Deeply influenced by Zen teachings, he dusk. After a brief dinner break, they reassemble for instituted pre-game meetings and post-game hansei-kai evening workouts. Marathon drills, known as nagekomi, (self-reflection conferences) “where criticism and fines require pitchers to throw hundreds of pitches each day. were handed out and extra practice ordered next morning Similarly, batters are expected to take a minimum of for those players who had done particularly badly during 1,000 swings each day. In high school, the regimen can the day’s game,” Whiting explained. be even more intense. And it was through Zen that Kawakami viewed his In last year’s Koshien tournament, for example, a place in the world. “Through Zen I was able to see myself 16-year-old star named Tomohiro Anraku pitched and the world in a different perspective,” he told Whiting. every game in leading his team to the championship. That “It helped me realize how insignificant I was as an indi- amounted to 772 pitches over five games in nine days! vidual and how much I was indebted to others.” Some observers called this treatment “child abuse,” but Indeed, under Kawakami, everything was connected, Anraku is a budding star for whom the highest expecta- and he believed that even such a star player as Japanese tions are held. Not surprisingly, many young pitchers homerun king Sadaharu Oh could perform at such a high suffer career-ending arm and shoulder injuries, but the level only because of his teammates, who helped him by Japanese believe that intense practice regimens are the getting on base and by bunting (a popular tactic in Japa- key to success. The Japanese are quick to point out nese baseball) runners into scoring position for Oh. Oh that there have been far fewer (UCL bought into Kawakami’s philosophy and liked to sign his reconstruction) surgeries for their pitchers than for autographs with the word doryoku, which means effort. hurlers in the U.S. American players who journeyed to Japan at the end One dedicated practitioner of such tactics was of their careers to make a bit more money and continue Tetsuharu Kawakami, a star player in his own right in playing were often overwhelmed by such a culture and

27 environment. Most failed to adapt and returned to the on Japanese players in the U.S. remains at a fever . U.S. The few (foreigners — each team is now Some see great irony in this development. allowed four gaijin on its roster) who found success Shihoko Goto, the senior Northeast Asia associate struggled with the harsh regimen. at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, spoke Sportswriter Kennichi Ishida wrote that Americans about the paradox. “It’s interesting,” she said. “If you simply didn’t understand the true ramifications of watch the nighttime news in Japan, what gets featured the heavy workload. “They are purely mental,” Ishida in the sports segments are the Japanese players in the wrote. “Yes, they do wear a player out but that is U.S. So the Japanese are actually celebrating the indi- necessary in order to develop his spirit. Athletics is es- vidual who took the risk, left the culture, the food and sentially an act of will. You can always do more than you family behind to go the U.S., and did well. It’s been a think you are capable of.” source of tremendous pride in Japan.” Goto suggested that the nation’s long period of eco- nomic decline over the past two decades after the go-go “Japan Inc.” decade of the 1980s has had a significant The More Things impact on Japanese attitudes about traditional values. “The Japanese have had a lot of introspection about Change, the More what it means to be Japanese,” Goto said. “Baseball defines what it means to be an excellent Japanese. It’s They Stay the Same often not the collective but the individual who takes a According to , a former player in Japan risk and challenges the orthodoxy.” and now an agent for Japanese players, the 12 teams Though plenty of Japanese “salarymen” still put in in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball league have 70- and 80-hour workweeks, younger Japanese have evolved over time, but “nothing has really changed.” begun to question the status quo. Global communica- Players remain under intense pressure to adhere to the tions, the Internet, social media, the influx of Western Japanese game’s traditions, and the owners, in essence, entertainment and ideas, and the inevitable impact each representing a big corporation, retain tremendous all this has had on a new generation of Japanese are control over the players’ lives (see sidebar). causing some tremors in Japanese society. “Unless Japa- Meanwhile, the attention and excitement focused nese values are changed and risk takers are rewarded

he played for several years for 1960s, but he was forced to the Yakult Swallows. return to Japan. It would be 30 Nomura moved to Los Angeles years before another Japanese in 1982, and, after a rash of player changed into a Major career changes, eventually League Baseball uniform. became a with a , an ace pitcher focus on Japanese players. But for the Kintetsu Buffaloes, Nomura was astounded by the decided he had had enough. He draconian reserve system that wanted a chance to pitch against essentially bound Japanese the elite players in the U.S. and players to their teams for a earn the riches promised by the minimum of nine years. Fear of American game. He decided to losing its elite players to America challenge the Japanese system. caused Nippon Professional He hired Nomura to be his At 57, Don Nomura knows Baseball (NPB) to find ways to agent, and Nomura uncovered a something about the Japanese keep their top athletes at home. loophole in the reserve system game. Nomura grew up in Japan, Though the bonds have loosened that allowed a voluntarily the son of an American father somewhat, it remains difficult for retired player to go the U.S. At and Japanese mother, and he a Japanese star to emigrate. Nomura’s advice, Nomo, who played high-school baseball In 1994, however, it seemed had six more years before he there. Nomura traveled to the impossible. A pitcher named could become eligible for a United States for college, where had played new deal, demanded a six-year he continued playing ball, and for two seasons for the San $30 million package from the then returned to Japan, where Francisco Giants in the early Buffaloes. Nomura was kicked and success is redefined, then Japan is not going to be ranges endorsements for the players and takes a cut.” competitive at all,” Goto stated. Though it remains widely popular, there is evi- In longstanding traditional arenas like baseball, dence, not unlike in the U.S., that baseball’s allure however, social revolutions are tougher to unleash. The is fraying a bit at the edges. More Japanese watch highest paid Japanese player makes less than $6 million satellite broadcasts of MLB games with Japanese stars a year, a pittance compared to the highest paid stars in than those of local teams. Baseball is no longer the de the U.S. The average salary is around $380,000, which facto water cooler topic every morning. “The younger is $120,000 less than the major league minimum salary generation thinks baseball is too slow,” Whiting said. in the U.S. Though Whiting acknowledges that there “They’re more into video games.” are talented players in Japan who could fit well in the But one thing that has not changed in Japanese American game, they remain restricted. The time period baseball is the culture of selflessness. As Whiting for international free agency is nine years. A “posting” wrote, “A player’s behavior is considered just as impor- system was established within the past decade to allow tant as his average, and untoward behavior is U.S. teams to pay large sums to Japanese teams for the viewed as bad for team morale and detrimental to the right to negotiate with their players, but the team owner organization’s image. In Japan, a ‘real man’ is one who has to be willing to let that player leave. keeps his emotions to himself and thinks instead of As in the U.S., there is a players union in Japanese others’ feelings.”  baseball, but according to Nomura, “the players as- sociation is impotent. It has never fought against ownership, never negotiated a labor agreement.” The only players’ strike took place in 2004 and lasted two days. It was such a shameful display Dodgers’ of selfishness in the players’ own eyes that they ace pitcher couldn’t endure it. Hideo Nomo “With all the changes over the years, there hasn’t been another strike,” Whiting said. “The players still don’t have the right to their own image; the team owns that. The team ar-

out of the meeting. Agents are at the right time,” Nomura said. anathema to Japanese baseball, “He showed a lot of guts going and in the mid-1990s, it was against the grain, and he was nearly heresy to show up with an very strong-minded.” agent by your side. Squabbling And a funny thing happened. over contracts was simply not Nomo, using his signature tolerated. But he and Nomo corkscrew delivery and kept coming back with the same , went 13 and 6 and won demand. Finally, the owner of Rookie of the Year honors in the Buffaloes got fed up and told 1995. And in Japan, the anger Nomo he could retire. suddenly metamorphosed into Nomo immediately signed nationalistic pride. Here was with the , one of their own, showing he and the Japanese media along could compete and win against with the public erupted with the vaunted Americans, and the vitriol. Nomo was labeled Japanese loved nothing more a traitor who disrupted the than showing up the Americans. harmony of the game. Detractors Fans in Tokyo gathered under said Nomo was doomed to fail. giant Jumbotron screens to But he had a strong will, and the watch his games. Nomo went on criticism only made him more to a successful 13-year career in determined to succeed, which he which he led the did — spectacularly. in in 1995 and pitched “Nomo was the right person two no-hitters.