NPB Tracker

While the MLB postseason is ready to come to what will certainly be a dramatic end, the NPB playoffs are just about to begin. The Climax Series opens for both leagues on Saturday, October 29 (JST), with the third place and second place finishers squaring off in the opening round. As a refresher, here is the format of the NPB postseason:

• Climax Series, First Stage: best of three series between the second place and third place finishers.
• Climax Series, Second Stage: best of seven series between the league champion (first place finisher) and the First Stage winner. The league champion is automatically credited with a one-win advantage.
• Japan Series: best of seven series between the Central League Climax Series winner and Pacific League Climax Series winner.

Pacific League First Stage: Seibu vs Nippon Ham

I’m going to credit Nippon Ham with with an immediate win because of the presence of Yu Darvish, and then a second one because of their superior pitching and defense. Pick: Nippon Ham, 2-0. Key player: Yu Darvish.

Central League First Stage: Yomiuri vs Yakult

Though the Swallows and Giants finished a game apart in the standings, they went in opposite directions this season. Yakult got off to a hot start and faded down the stretch, while Yomiuri had to claw their way into contention after a sub-par start. Yakult won the season series 12-8-4, but Yomiuri has stronger pitching and most offensive threats overall. Pick Yomiuri, 2-1. Key player: Hisayoshi Chono.

Pacific League Second Stage: Nippon Ham vs Softbank

Softbank has every edge here: a deeper rotation, a better lineup, a 16-7-1 regular season record against Nippon Ham, more rest, and a one-game advantage for finishing first. Softbank has also been on their game recently against Nippon Ham, with an 8-1-1 record against the Fighters in September and October. Pick: Softbank 4-1. Key player: Seiichi Uchikawa.

Central League Second Stage: Yomiuri vs Chunichi

This is a close call. Yomiuri has a narrow regular season 12-10-2 edge over Chunichi, and both teams prevented runs this season at about the same pace. Chunichi lineup is weak, the worst in the CL this year, but they have been bullpen options than Yomiuri. So a series of close games probably favors Chunichi, and of course they have the rest and automatic wins advantages, plus the Ochiai destiny. My gut is saying Chunichi, but my brain is saying Yomiuri. Pick Chunichi 4-3. Key player: Takuya Asao.

Japan Series: Chunichi vs Softbank

Maybe it’s bland to predict a Japan Series between the two league champions, but that’s what I see. It’s probably equally bland to pick the more statistically dominant team to win as well… but it’s hard to pick against Softbank. They allowed 59 fewer runs than anyone else in Japan, with a 2.30 team ERA. Offensively they finished second overall to Seibu’s Okawari-kun-fueled lineup, but their 550 runs was 66 better than third place Yakult. Chunichi has enough pitching to keep the games close, but ultimately suffers with a big disadvantage at the plate.

Pick: Softbank 4-2. Key player: Tsuyoshi Wada (with wins in games two and six).

A couple of days ago, a major news agency published a report stating that Yu Darvish has decided to pursue an MLB career via the posting system this offseason. The news was widely repeated and set off a wave of speculation.

Unfortunately it was a little premature. On the 19th, Darvish shot down the report on his personal blog. I’ve translated the entirety of his blog post below (hope he doesn’t mind):

Articles saying “Confirmed: Darvish to the Majors!” have been appearing since yesterday.

As I mentioned on Twitter

Nothing is decided!!

I haven’t decided anything for myself so nothing can be confirmed.(^_^;)

It was an article from the Kyodo News, but what did they base their writing on?

You can say this is freedom of press, but with freedom comes responsibility.

I want a press that takes responsibility.

Every year, when I haven’t decided anything, they write “Majors this, Majors that”, but then when I don’t go they just make up excuses.

How did they write lies and escape responsibility?

Well, after the entire schedule is over, I will carefully think it over!

As soon as I decide I will let everyone know(^^)v

(as always, if the Nihongo speakers in the audience see any issues with my translation, please feel free to let me know.)

So there we have it.

My best guess is that whatever information the original reporting was based on came from the Nippon Ham side. Team owner Hiroji Okoso has been quite chatty about Darvish lately, most recently commenting “for an ace of his stature, if he’s willing to stay we’d have to think about JPY 700m, no, JPY 1bn.” That’s quite a statement, as it would shatter the record for highest-paid NPB player.

There’s obviously huge interest in what will happen with Darvish, so the speculation won’t stop. But the only guy with real credibility on the topic is Darvish himself.

I heard from a source earlier in the evening that Randy Messenger has agreed to a contract to return to Hanshin for 2012. I spoke with Messenger’s agent Matt Sosnick, who confirmed that it’s a one-year deal with an option for 2013.

Messenger had a strong second-year effort for the Tigers, posting a 12-7 record with a 2.88 ERA and 120 strikeouts over 25 starts and 150 innings pitched. Messenger with 12th among Central League pitchers in ERA, 11th in strikeouts, and 15th in innings pitched.

Yesterday, NPB crowned two winners: Chunichi clinched the Central League title, and Seibu took the third and final playoff spot in the Pacific League.

My hat is way off to Chunichi, and manager Hiromitsu Ochiai for a well-deserved douage. I predicted before the season that this would be the year we’d see the Dragons finally stumble back into the B-class, but they proved me wrong, securing the first renpa (consecutive titles) in team history. Ochiai won with arguably less talent than any of his previous winners. The Dragons again sported a rather punchless lineup, but like the rest of the teams, the life was choked out of their standout bats by the new home run-limiting ball. Chunichi dominated on the mound though, and while the Dragons feature some outstanding pitchers, the supporting cast played an important role. Six Dragons pitchers who appeared in 30 games or more have a higher number of games than innings pitched, suggesting that Ochiai played matchups aggressively. It’s a fitting, if unfortunate, conclusion to a remarkable eight-year run for Ochiai-kantoku.

The race for the third playoff spot in the Pacific League was the more compelling storyline for me, as it was the only thing that really amounted to a race down the stretch. Both Orix and Seibu played well enough in September to make things interesting, then cooled off a bit in October. Longer time readers of this site might not be surprised to find out that I was disappointed to see Orix lose the battle of attrition, choking away their hard-earned lead with a 3-9-1 October record. Seibu’s 7-5-2 mark was solid enough to overtake Orix on the final day of the season. Looking back, the real pivotal point of the race was October 6, Seibu’s 2-1 walk-off win over Orix. Had the Buffaloes managed to take that one, they’d be looking ahead to the playoffs rather than the offseason. Of course, there wouldn’t have been a race at all had Seibu not played so horribly early in the year, and they have a much better roster and match up better with all of their prospective of playoff opponents.

The playoffs start on October 29. Bring ’em on.

It is my very great pleasure to announce that Eno Sarris and I have gotten a story published in ESPN the Magazine. It’s available online now (Insider subscription required) and in the October 17 edition of the print magazine. You’ll have to click the link to find out what it’s about.

I’ve learned a lot about prospects from reading John Sickels over the years. John gives prospects letter grades the same way American schools do, and he’s a pretty tough grader. He’s never given an A+, but recently described what one would theoretically look like.

A Grade A+ pitching prospect would have four plus-plus pitches, exceptional command and control, a great body, perfect mechanics, no injury history, outstanding makeup, and a brilliant performance record. Again, I’ve never seen anyone like that. There is always some flaw somewhere, no matter how minor.

I think I’ve seen someone who comes pretty close to that: Yu Darvish. Yes, it’s probably unfair to throw Darvish in with younger minor league and amateur prospects, but he’s young enough at 25, and still yet to throw a Major League pitch.

Against John’s criteria, the only question marks for me are whether Darvish’s best four pitches grade as plus-plus, or merely plus, and how “perfect” mechanics are defined (Darvish has tinkered with his delivery over the years). Aside from that, everything else is there — the physique, makeup, health record and performance record.

The title of this post might be ambiguous. It refers to “amateur scouting” as in me as an amateur scout of baseball players, rather than the practice of scouting amateur baseball players.

Anyway, in the three years since I started this site, I’ve become a much better observer of baseball. I’d put part of this down to getting to know and interact with people in the industry, and rest down to knowing that my observations are going to be read. Obviously I’m nowhere near the level of a professional scout, but hopefully I’ve refined my eye for baseball and developed the right habits.

In this post I’d like to share the things I’ve learned to look for. And here they are:

Pitching

• fastball velocity, movement
• number of breaking pitches
• breaking pitches velocity, movement
• fastball control/command
• secondary pitch control/command
• location, location, location
• “out pitch”
• efficiency
• tempo
• composure
• effort, smoothness, deception of delivery
• delivery from the windup versus the stretch
• performance with runners on base
• how often does he make mistakes?
• is he giving up hard contact?
• ground balls or fly balls?
• defense

For me, what the pitcher does is most interesting part of the game, so I pay far more attention to that than anything else.

Hitting

• contact skill
• power
• batting eye
• patience
• plate coverage
• swing mechanics
• which fields does he hit to?
• fastball hitter or breaking ball hitter?
• front leg hitter or back leg hitter?
• situational hitting

I must admit I’ve only recently begun to seriously think about hitting. The challenge with evaluating hitters is that I feel that I need to see a guy multiple times before I really much about him.

Defense

• range
• arm strength, accuracy
• positioning
• first step, release
• turning double plays (infielders only)
• instincts — throwing to the right base, knowing when to charge and when to lay back, etc
• first baseman — does he catch everything the other infielders throw his way?

For me, getting a read on how well an outfielder is playing is the hardest thing to do when watching a game on TV or online. It can be hard to tell where an outfielder started from, whether he should have made a play or not, whether he had a chance to throw out a runner or not… plays on the infield are much easier to judge since there’s more opportunity to see the whole play develop.

Defense (catchers)

• game calling
• throwing out base stealers
• fielding pop-ups
• fielding bunts and throwing to first
• blocking pitches in the dirt
• handling throws from the outfield and blocking the plate on scoring plays

I never thought about what a catcher needs to do well, aside from the first two bullet points, until a friend and I were talking about Mike Piazza’a defensive reputation, and I asked “what was it that he didn’t do well?” We couldn’t remember, other than throwing out base stealers.

When I woke up this morning and did my daily check of the news, I was surprised to see headlines that included the words “Ochiai” and “leaving the team”. My first thought was, “why is Hiromitsu Ochiai stepping down as manager of the Chunichi Dragons?” But he’s not quitting, Chunichi’s management has decided not to renew his contract, electing to replace him with 70 year-old former Dragons manager Morimichi Takagi. When given the news from Chunichi owner Bungo Shirai, Ochiai said, “yes, understood”, and later commented “that’s the kind of world this is.”

This is either pure baseball idiocy or there’s something behind the scenes that isn’t public knowledge. Ochiai’s Dragons have done little other than win since he took over in 2004. In the seven seasons he’s managed, the Dragons have finished first or second every year, except 2008, when they finished third. The Dragons have also made four Nippon Series appearances under Ochiai’s watch (2004, 2006, 2007, 2010), winning the big prize in 2007. This year, despite my predictions, the Dragons are again in second place, within striking distance of first place Yakult as the season winds down.

The Dragons’ success has come in spite of losing star contributors like Kosuke Fukudome, Kenshin Kawakami and Tyrone Woods over the years. Chunichi for the most part hasn’t acquired expensive replacements for their departed stars, instead extracting useful performances from bargain bin foreign players like Tony Blanco and Enyelbert Soto, and developing prospects like Wei-Yin Chen, Kazuki Yoshimi and Masahiko Morino. The one notable free agent signing Chunichi made, Kazuhiro Wada (to replace Fukudome), blossomed into an MVP winner under Ochiai.

So I don’t get it. I think this is the worst NPB managerial change since Yomiuri forced Tatsunori Hara out and replaced with with the reviled Tsuneo Horiuchi following the 2003 season (Hara’s crime: finishing second to Hanshin). The winner could wind up being Nippon Ham, the team Ochiai finished his playing career with, if they can convince him to move north to Hokkaido and replace outgoing manager Masataka Nashida.

Update: Daily Sports says Ochiai is on his way out because of his high salary (JPY 370m) and the fact that Chunichi never turned a profit during his run as manager.

I’m pleased to welcome our latest contributor, Randy Fuller, to NPB Tracker. Here’s a little about Randy, in his own words:

A native of San Diego and fan of the Padres since the 1970’s, Randy discovered NPB while living in Japan between 2000 and 2003. He dedicated most of his personal life to watching Giants games on TV every night and reading the sports dailies. Randy also spent much of his time in Japan traveling to several ballparks and learning the strategy and idiosyncrasies that make the Japanese game unique. He has been an enthusiast and proponent for pro yakyu for a decade and counting.

Randy has already published his first post, and needless to say, we’re happy to have him on board.

It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these. So long, in fact, that the draft post had some links from July in it. Between when I started this and now, some interesting random things have happened. Here are a few of them.

• The Orix Buffaloes promoted Freddy Ballestas to their shihaika roster back in July.
• Also in July, Softbank lefty Tsuyoshi Wada took home his 100th career win. He achieved the feat in his 200th career game, the eight fastest pace of all time and the fastest for a lefty, ahead of teammate Toshiya Sugiuchi.
• In other Wada news, Tsuyoshi reached the service time requirements for free agency on September 16 and is widely expected to make a run at an MLB contract this offseason. Said Wada: “I’m honestly happy [about reaching free agency]. I haven’t had a chance to think about it yet. [The team and] I haven’t had a detailed discussion yet, but I’ve been told I’m needed.” He looked pretty happy about the achievement.
• Hiroshima is holding a tryout on September 24th, for men aged 17 to 24 and over 175 cm tall. This is aimed at Japanese, NPB draft-eligible players.
• Sport Hochi speculates that Yokohama could release all eight of their foreign players this offseason. I suspect they’ll hold on to their Taiwanese prospects but move on from the rest.
• Whomever runs the official Orix Buffaloes Twitter feed wants to attend UEFA Champion League matches.
• A fan fell on the field during the September 16th Swallows-Carp game in Hiroshima, after climbing the outfield fence trying to retrieve a ball thrown into the stands by Yakult outfielder Norichika Aoki. Aoki commented, “he seemed pretty drunk. I’m glad that he seemed to not get hurt.”
• Journalist Misako Hida recently did an interesting interview with Kei Igawa for the Japanese version of the Wall Street Journal. Among the insights: Igawa wants to sign with an MLB organization that will give him a chance to reach the majors, he doesn’t get recognized much when he goes out, and he realized the Yankees didn’t know him when the GM and manager asked what his best pitch at a meeting during his first year.
• @mykbo had a Tweet this morning saying that Lotte pitcher Lee Yong-hoon has thrown the first minor league perfect game in the history of the KBO.

English language bonus link:

• Twins blog Over the Baggy has some interesting analysis of Tsuyoshi Nishioka’s defense in his first year with the Twins. The author makes some excellent observations. Better, I would say, than anything I’ve done in this area.