NPB Tracker

Hideki Irabu won his first appearance for the Long Beach Armada, striking out six in six innings.

Reports out of Japan put his hardest fastball at 92 mph, and Sanspo has plenty of pictures if you’re interested.

Randy Johnson won his 300th game on Thursday, proving everyone who said we wouldn’t see another 300 winner after Tom Glavine wrong.

Lets look back at Johnson’s phenomenal career through his appearances in the old US-Japan Nichibei Series, which used to take place in November of even-numbered years.

1990

Johnson vs. Hiromitsu Ochiai

Johnson vs. Koji Akiyama

Johnson vs. Akinobu Okada

Interestingly, Ochiai and Akiyama are now managing NPB teams, and Okada ran Hanshin for five years. Note that Johnson is pretty wild here, and is inconsistent with his follow through. Still, none of the hitters look good against him.

Now let’s fast forward ten years, to 2000.

2000

Johnson vs Hideki Matsui

Johnson vs Tsuyoshi Shinjo

Johnson vs Norihiro Nakamura

Interestingly, all of these guys played in the majors in the years following this series. Johnson looks a lot more mature as a pitcher and a lot more fluid with his mechanics. He made Shinjo look like a fool in that at bat, though Shinjo was actually pretty good overall in the series.

Remember Kazuo Fukumori? Kinda? The other day I stumbled across a Chunichi report on his whereabouts from a couple weeks ago.

The inconsistent righty has failed to make much of an impression with Texas, and according to the report, now the Rangers are looking to send him back to Japan. Texas GM Jon Daniels was quoted as saying “we’d like to transfer Fukumori’s rights to a Japanese club. We’ve already communicated the direction we’re taking to Fukumori through his agent”. Daniels reportedly shopped him to other MLB teams but couldn’t find any takers. I don’t think he’ll have much better luck from NPB teams unless Fukumori can prove he’s healthy.

According to the same report, Fukumori is training in Arizona. He’s coming back from a herniated disk that he had operated on last autumn. 

In other news, Seibu is looking for bullpen help with closer Alex Graman on the shelf. They’ve been looking at US minor leaguers and are sending someone to Korea this month to look at prospects. I suppose Fukumori could be a fit if he’s healthy.

Here’s maybe a minute’s worth of entertainment. Should be playable whether you can read Japanese or not. Just click ‘game start’ to play and then left click to swing.

Yusei Kikuchi really knows how to pack ’em in. He pitched in a practice game against Yokohama High School, drawing about 300 spectators, 30 of whom were scouts. Seven Japanese teams were on hand, as were scouts from the Rangers, Mariners, Mets and Yankees. Kikuchi did his part, going six innings and allowing one run on four hits with five strikeouts, while hitting 93 on the gun.

Some reactions to Kikuchi’s performance…

Mets Scout Russ Bove: “I can’t go into details, but he’s a good player.”

Yankees Scout Shoichi Kida: “Going forward we need to see him player a lot more games. I want to see more.”

Kikuchi himself: “Recently I’ve gotten to where I can relax and throw (in front of pro scouts). I was able to hold the other-wordly Yokohama to one run in six innings, so it feels like I’m maturing.”

Kikuchi is showing up in the media as a number of teams’ intended first-round pick in this year’s draft. It’ll be interesting to see what happens if this MLB interest escalates, or if Kikuchi reciprocates.

Hiroshima ace Kan Ohtake is trying to extend his scoreless innings streak against Hisashi Iwakuma and the Rakuten Eagles. Check it out on NPB Live. It’s playing on the topmost Justin.tv player.

Update: Orix vs Yokohama has started on the second player.

Not too long ago, I stumbled across the information that former Rakuten Eagle Yuji Yoshioka is playing in the Mexican League. He’s off to a pretty good start, hitting .302/.409/.469 through 29 games.

Former SoftBank Hawk Michinao Yamamura also played in the Mexican League this year, but has apparently been release after putting up an 8.22 era in 15.1 innings.

Several former suketto such as Pedro Valdes, Derrick White, and Nerio Rodriguez are active in the Mexican League this season as well.

Note: corrected walks total.

Last winter, Yakult Swallows fireballer Ryota Igarashi declined to file for domestic free agency, instead re-signing for 2009 with the subsequent goal of moving to the majors. Igarashi is a righthanded reliever who has spent his entire career with the Yakult Swallows, and just turned 30 on May 28. If I had to pick the top free agent coming out of Japan after this season today, Igarashi would be my choice.

Stuff, Results & Mechanics
Igarashi is known one of the hardest throwers in Japan, and jointly holds the record for fastest pitch* by a Japanese pitcher in an NPB game with a 158 kmph (98.75mph) fastball. Igarashi hit 158 kmph in 2004, when the average speed of his pitches over the course of the season was 154.5 kmph (96.6mph), which is an NPB record he has to himself.

Although he doesn’t throw quite as hard as he used to, but still runs his heater into the upper 90’s, and augments it with a hard splitter that he throws at around 90mph. He’s also got a slider and a curve that he’ll mix in occasionally, but is primarily a fastball/splitter pitcher.

Igarashi’s weakness has been his control. Over the course of his career through 2008, he’s allowed 221 walks and thrown 42 wild pitches over 517.1 innings. I suspect the number of walks would be higher if hitters could lay off the high fastball a little more. On the plus side, he’s balanced things out strking out 586 guys. Igarashi showed a significant improvement in his walk rate after returning from injury (see below) last season, allowing just six walks in 42.1 innings.  This year he’s come back to earth and allowed seven walks in 19.1 innings so far, which is more in line with his career norms.

When pitching out of the windup, Igarashi has a hitch at the beginning of his delivery, a la Daisuke Matsuzaka, but otherwise has a pretty orthodox approach. This YouTube clip from late April 2009 gives a good look at his mechanics. Here’s another clip of him striking out a Yokohama BayStars side in 2008.

*trivia question: who is he tied with?

Injury History
Igarashi had the worst year of his career in 2006, and bounced between the top club and the farm team during the second half of the season. After the season, it was discovered that he had a ruptured UCL in his throwing arm, and he went in for Tommy John surgery. He spent all of 2007 rehabbing, and didn’t return to game action for good until around July 2008. He has regained his velocity post-injury and has had a normal work load since last summer.

Role
Igarashi has been mostly a middle reliever in his career thus far, setting up for Shingo Takatsu early in his career and more recently for Chang-Yong Lim. He did spend 2004 as Yakult’s closer after Takatsu left, and recorded 37 saves. He’s a set-up man again this year.

Future
Igarashi spoke last season of making a “Shinjyo-class” move to MLB, which I took to mean he’d be willing to take less money to try his hand at MLB. Recall that Tsuyoshi Shinjyo, as he spelled it back then, turned down about $12m from Hanshin to take a minimum-pay deal with the Mets. I don’t think Igarashi will have to take that kind of a cut, because he’s making about $840k this year and I think he’d be able to get at least that much from an MLB team. His best offers may still come from Japan though, as he could probably command an NPB closer’s salary.

Hanshin signed and introduced Craig Brazell on May 28 (JST). Craig gets a contract through the end of the season paying him $250k plus performance bonuses. No word current word on when he’s expected to debut but previous reports put it around June 5th. “I want to taste victory,” commented Brazell.