Ichiro & Matsui

Ichiro Suzuki is now a national hero, again. He broke George Sisler's record and is now the greatest hitter of all time, as far as a single season goes. Never mind it took him a few extra games and 80 some extra at bats to do it. The proof is in the batting averages of the two players who have held that record. George Sisler batted over .400 when he set the record...Ichiro is batting .370-something. When it took Roger Maris all those extra games to break Babe Ruth's record the then-commissioner of baseball put an asterisk next to the record, which was removed after maris died by a more realistic Fay Vincent while he was commissioner. As far as the Japanese are concerned those extra games were put on the schedule so that Ichiro could break the record. Who cares?? He holds an American baseball record. If he took steroids and hit 75 homeruns he would still be a hero in Japan.

In most of America no one really cares that Ichiro broke it. Americans think it's cool and it's an accomplishment, but no one really cares beyond that. In NY there was a great article in Newsday today. The article's title: "Maybe it's too subtle Japanese import's shattering of one of baseball's oldest records is impressive, but it's no home run." There was another great article in the Toledo Blade titled "Very Few Care That Ichiro is Hitting Machine." Then in The Oregonian there was an article titled "Suzuki's Record Chase Anything but Fun." I think this is kind of unfair. Suzuki set the record. Yes his batting average is lower, yes he took more at bats to do it...but in all honesty when the schedule was extended to 162 games to accomodate baseball's expansion they had to anticipate that records would be broken if there were extra games. Now in saying that, George Sisler would obviously have had more hits ad his season been 162 games. Just like Babe Ruth would have more post season home runs than Bernie Williams, who with 19 holds the all time Major League record. Quite interesting to think about. Now that arguement can't be made in the case of Nolan Ryan, with his 5,000 plus k's no one is anywhere near close to him...never will be anyone close to him anytime soon.

That brings me to Hideki Matsui. No one ever thought this guy would be a 30 home run hitter, 100 RBI getter, and a .300 hitter all in the same season. Nor did they think he would be a 2 time all-star in his first two seasons. His accomplishments are amazing if you think about it. Being a home run hitter is easy in Japan. Shit...Roberto Petagine, who couldn't hit a beer league softball out of the infield when he played for the Mets, is a top notch home run hitter here in Japan. Not to detract from his successes here, but the competition is like being in the AAA Minors compared to the Majors...just not the same.

I had an Esa Tikkanen sighting. He now plays hockey for a team in Korea called Halla Winia..his team lost in a bloodbath to a Japanese team...bad idea putting a Korean team against a Japanese team in a hockey match...there was more fighting than at a K-1 event.

I quit the bar...sick of working there. Going to start teaching English soon. Much easier, not at night.

Last night reaffirmed my opinion that Roppongi is no longer as fun as it used to be.

I turn 23 in one month! And Paul arrives in Tokyo from Afghanistan that day!