Discussion Thread
Not much time to write today, but there’s still a lot going on. If you to chat about what I said about Yu Darvish, or Tsuyoshi Wada’s deal with Baltimore, please leave a comment.
And another minor bit of news: the Yokohama DeNA BayStars have granted Hiroki Sanada his release, so that he may pursue an MLB deal. Sanada was posted unsuccessfully last week.
13/12/2011 at 5:48 pm Permalink
Hichori launches one off Wada.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkL05v_evL8
By the way, Teikyo was upset by Wada’s team that year.
13/12/2011 at 10:27 pm Permalink
This question isn’t really related to any of the names listed above, but the “all questions answered” thread was closed, so I wasn’t sure where else to ask this. What’s going on with Igawa? I was under the impression that his contract with the Yankees was up, but he was going to attempt to sign with another MLB team. Have you heard anything about him Patrick?
Thanks!
13/12/2011 at 10:55 pm Permalink
Comments close on posts after a week, as a means of controlling spam. Spam basically disappeared after I set that up.
Anyway, there was a bunch of talk about Igawa early in the offseason, but it seems to have died down. Rakuten tried to get him, but gave up pretty quickly. Orix reportedly had some interest but I haven’t seen anything on it in a while. He said in the WSJ that he wanted to get another shot at MLB, so I would expect that he’ll wind up in camp somewhere as an NRI.
14/12/2011 at 9:27 am Permalink
Thanks Patrick! Sorry about posting that question in an unrelated thread…
14/12/2011 at 6:30 pm Permalink
Big Korean slugger Lee Dae-ho signed with Orix (after winning the triple crown last year with 1.103 OPS and 1.011 OPS this year). Has anyone figured out KBO-NPB translations yet? That might be interesting. And what’s your expectation? Much like NPB-MLB transfers, KBO-NPB transfers have been very much hit and miss (with more misses as far as I can remember) with the usual dependencies on personality, cultural adjustment, etc. along with new pitchers, parks, tougher competition and so on.
14/12/2011 at 6:31 pm Permalink
I remember him launching a massive opposite field homerun in the last WBC in one of the games against Japan in Tokyo, if my memory’s correct.
14/12/2011 at 7:01 pm Permalink
You can add Rusty Ryal to MLB-NPB calculation samples.
14/12/2011 at 11:46 pm Permalink
How many good Korean hitters have we seen move from KBO to NPB? Lee Seung-Yeop was awesome in his prime, but his prime was short and it took him a year to adjust. Kim Tae-Kyun was alright last year, but just lost it this year. Chunichi’s CF (can’t remember his name) was alright… anyone else?
There have been some good Korean pitchers in NPB though — Lim, Sun, even Park was alright last year when he was healthy.
15/12/2011 at 12:30 am Permalink
Lim was washed up in Korea but revived his career in Tokyo.
There’s been some Japanese players going to Korea, and imports switching countries (like Greisinger).
15/12/2011 at 12:33 am Permalink
The best Korean player (before KBO). He moved from NPB to KBO. Does that count?
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E7%99%BD%E4%BB%81%E5%A4%A9
15/12/2011 at 2:31 am Permalink
Another Lee… That’s a lot of Lees (you’d think there’d be more Kims…). Korean hitters who played in Chunichi were both Lees as well. Byung-gyu Lee, and Jong-bum Lee (dunno if I spelled them right).
Byung-gyu Lee was the outfielder, but I think he still holds a sort of NPB record for the lowest OBP after regular ABs – so I wouldn’t really call that “alright”… Jong-bum Lee also played outfield (RF I think) after he showed some dismal performance as SS. I recall he seemed okay at first but began to steadily suck both defensively and offensively.
For pitchers I think Samson Lee and Koo were also okay.
As regards to Dae-ho, I stand by my original judgement – his power tool is overrated and we really shouldn’t expect too much from him with the no-fly ball in play. His (very) bad base-running and defensive capabilities is not helping.
15/12/2011 at 6:29 am Permalink
Where did Greisinger play in the KBO again?
15/12/2011 at 8:07 pm Permalink
1.5 years from mid-2005 at Kia. His first season in Japan with the Swallows was even better than his years at Kia.