Take Me out to the Old Yakyu

Take Me Out to the Old Yakyu You might never believe it when you look at American store shelves crowded with Japanese transistor radios, binoculars, and cameras, but ships also sail the other way, carrying American products and ideas to Japan. And at least one American game - baseball - has had amazing success there. Some ten million Japanese pay their way into the ball parks of the two six-team leagues every season, and uncounted other millions sit transfixed in front of TV sets, sloshing down their maki-zuski (raw-fish covered with rice and wrapped in seaweed) with good Japanese lager beer. The country is less than two-thirds the size of Texas, yet the Japanese boast forty stadiums, complete with lights for night ball, capable of staging major league ball games. Vacant lots of Japan are all one size - small - but kids play baseball on all of them. Profits are not a problem for Japanese baseball teams. Except for the Tokyo Giants, none of them makes money. Teams are all owned by corporations that use them for public relations, and the clubs are usually named not for cities but for the companies that control them. The Nankai Hawks and the Hankyu Braves both play in Osaka and are owned by railroads. Organized baseball has been part of the Japanese sports scene since the early 1930's. An American witnessing a Japanese game would certainly recognize it as baseball, but he would also realize that the game has acquired a distinct Japanese flavor, starting with the name of the game, which they call yakyu. Other differences abound. In the United States, for example, a pitcher is pampered like a prize poodle for twenty-four hours before he is scheduled to start a game; in Japan he's supposed to pitch every day. And the cure for a sore arm is not rest but more pitching. A lot of Japanese pitchers have puzzling sidearm deliveries, and all have a pitch called the shuts. This is a fast ball that breaks down and in on a right-handed batter. It's part sinker, part screwball, and part mystery. When a Japanese player fails to hit and he's asked what the pitch was, he invariably shakes his head sadly and says, "Shuta." One unique aspect of Japanese ball became clear as I watched a game in Tokyo's Korakuen Stadium. One Wally Yonamine was on first base for the Giants, and another runner was on second. When the ball was hit to right field, Yonamine, an alert sort and the best base runner in the game, correctly estimated it as a base hit. He took off for second, where the other runnner was trying to decide whether or not to head for third. Yonamine, running with his head down roared past his teammate. The umpire on second base was a bony, sad-faced man name Hiroya Tomizawa. Wearing white cotton gloves and looking as an all Japanese umpire, rather like a badly dressed traffic cop, Tomizawa summoned all his dignity, threw his right thumb into the air, and called Yonamize out. There were 30,000 people in the stadium, and they all began to throw things. "Hotakuso!" (unskilled one) the crowd shouted at Tomizawa, unleashing colorful bon voyage streamers usually saved for the end of the game. Cheerleaders blew police whistles and angrily waved banners. On the field an argument raged. No matter what Tomizawa thought he saw, the manager of the Giants insisted heatedly it could not have happened. Everybody knew a player of Yonamine's skill simply could not have done anything so stupid as to pass his teammate. This made so much sense that Tomizawa was forced to call in the other umpires for a consultation. There are six in each game. The white gloves formed a circle on the black, grassless infield, and the debate lasted for a long time. At last, with bows all around, Tomizawa had won his point. By a vote of four to two, Wally Yonamine was out. Had the vote gone against Tomizawa, he would have had to step to the public-address system, remove his hat, bow, and explain his error to the multitude. It is, the Japanese believe, the least a bungling umpire can do. Other Japanese tactics strike Americans equally as strange. When a Japanese player strikes out, he comes back to the dugout laughing. "They act just the opposite of what they feel," says Gordon Windhorn, an American player on the Japanese circuit. "It's supposed to save face, but it drives guys like me crazy.” In one game Windhorn hit a double in the eleventh. Although Windy is the fastest man on the team, the manager consulted his ancestors and sent in a pinch runner. "And do you know what happened?" Windhorn muttered: "He got himself picked off - picked off before the next pitch!" Another aspect of the game that plucks the strings of American sanity is the traditional Japanese politeness. It is often said of American pitchers that they would knock down their own mothers. In Japan if a pitcher hits a batter, or even comes close, he steps toward the batter, doffs his cap, bows and says "Sumimasen," He is sorry. He owes an indefinite debt. There is now a move to ban Americans from Japanese baseball altogether. It is led by the Giants who, although it has cost them their domination of the game, have refused to sign an American player. "We have nothing against the Americans," says their stern, gold-toothed general manager impassively, "It is very easy to make a strong team if you get them. But Americans make no progress for Japan. Our dream of the future is that someday we will have a world-championship series between the United States and Japan..

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