NPB Tracker

It’s being widely reported that Hanshin is ready to negotiate with/sign former Seibu Lion Craig Brazell. Brazell hit .234 with 27 homers and 87 rbis. He’s currently playing with the St. Paul Saints of the Northern League. Honestly this comes across as a knee-jerk reaction.

Rakuten manager Katsuya Nomura seems to agree. “Hanshin is really bad at acquiring foreign players,” he said, before adding, “they’re in 5th place and six games under .500? That sucks. When I was there, the media would start with the “quit, quit” articles. Don’t just do that to me, do that to (Hanshin manager Akinobu) Mayumi too”.

Meanwhile, Seibu is also looking to add an import, due the loss of Brazell and now the shoulder injury of relief ace Alex Graman. Graman is hoping to return before the second half of the season, but surgey hasn’t been ruled out as a possibility. Team president Maeda was quoted as saying “it’s not just hitter, we’re looking into pitching too”.

Sanspo has published multiple articles about the Kevin Mench situation. This one says the Tigers have a list of six or seven guys, and quotes team president Nobuo Minami as saying they won’t release Mench, but are looking for him to make adjustments. An earlier report has Hanshin sending a team representative to America to negotiate a contract with a new slugger. According to the article, the trip is being delayed by the swine flu scare, but scouts Tom O’Malley and Andy Sheets are collecting data.

Sanspo is putting former Seibu Lion Craig Brazell in the lead for the spot. Brazell is with the St. Paul Saints after getting cut by Baltimore at the end of spring training, and should be available at a discount price. Surprisingly, Julio Zuleta’s name has been mentioned again. Zuleta had some good years in Fukuoka, but was pretty bad in his last few NPB seasons with Chiba Lotte, and currently sports a .233/.315/.391 line in the Mexican League. 

So who else might be on Hanshin’s list? They’re clearly after a power hitter who can play first base or right field.

Despite giving struggling import Kevin Mench a vote of confidence last month, importing another bat is apparently still on the table for Hanshin. Says owner Shinya Sakai: “I think Mench has gotten better so he’s been called up. I haven’t gotten a request to acquire someone from (manager Akinobu) Mayumi, but money is not a problem”.

The linked report suggests that Hanshin is looking at retreads Tyrone Woods, Craig Brazell, and Julio Zuleta. Woods seems like the best choice among that group, though I suspect they’ll keep looking.

So we know at this point that SoftBank is looking to import a bat toward the end of spring training. Takeuchi-COO, if you’re your listening, here are a few options:

• Dallas McPherson, 3B, Florida Marlins — hit 42 bombs in AAA last year.
• Andy Marte, 3B, Cleveland Indians — former top prospect cleared waivers and is headed back to AAA.
• Mike Hessman, 1B/3B, Detroit Tigers — quad-A type, hit for consistent power in AAA for the last seven years but hasn’t won an MLB job. Doesn’t hit for much average.
• Craig Brazell, 1B/DH, Baltimore Orioles — SoftBank apparently passed on him after Seibu let him go last offseason, but he showed power in Japan last year. Probably needs an injury to make the MLB team.
• Jeff Bailey, 1B/OF, Boston Red Sox — been pretty good in AAA the last few years.
• Scott Thorman, 1B, Milwaukee Brewers — got a shot with the Braves but didn’t hit. Has been pretty good in the minors, looks like another quad-A guy.
• Nelson Cruz, OF, Texas Rangers — the Hawks tried to get him twice last year. Even if Texas is willing to let him go, he won’t get through waivers. Still, SoftBank can dream.

Any other ideas for the Hawks?

Over the next couple weeks, I’ll be taking a look at player personnel moves made by each NPB this offseason. This series will not cover draftees or impact rookies, only additions and losses of experienced players. The focus will be on foreign players, but notable Japanese players will be included as well.

Coming: John Wasdin, Takayuki Shimizu

Going: Craig Brazell, Matt Kinney

Staying: Hiram Bocachica, Alex Graman, Koji Mitsui

Trending: neutral

Synopsis: very little change for the defending Japan Champions. It was a little bit of a surprise to see Brazell go after hitting 27 homers, but he did have a weak OBP. Shimizu arrives from Yomiuri for cash and should provide some bench/DH depth.

A couple of weeks ago, I was asked on NY Baseball Digest Radio if there were any foreign players in Japan who could potentially make an MLB comeback, a la Cecil Fielder. I drew a blank. Given a little time to think it over though, I came up with a couple of candidates:

• Colby Lewis, SP, Hiroshima Carp: took over for Hiroki Kuroda as Hiroshima’s ace, going 15-8 with a 2.68 era in 2008. Under contract for 2009.
• Alex Graman, RP, Saitama Seibu Lions: former Yankee has been lights-out since the Lions put him in the bullpen. Under contract for 2009.
• Craig Brazell, 1B, former Saitama Seibu Lions: cut loose after one year with the Lions, Brazell struck out too much in Japan and had a poor on-base performance, but did slug 27 home runs. I can see him playing AAA this year in an org that’s thin at 1b, and getting a shot if he performs well.
• Tyrone Woods, 1B, former Chunichi Dragons: cut loose after the ’08 season, coming off six consecutive 35+ HR seasons. He’s a real longshot to play in MLB in 2009, given that he’s 40 and plenty of MLB veterans are out of work this offseason, but then again Daryle Ward spent all of 2008 on the roster of a team that won 97 games.

Though not to the extent of Fielder, Hector Carrasco, Lee Stevens, and Darrell May are a couple examples of guys who enjoyed some big league success after playing in Japan. Fielder’s 1991 Detroit Tigers teammate Bill Gullickson played two seasons with the Yomiuri Giants, where he became good friends with feature major leaguer Masumi Kuwata. They were so close, in fact, that Gullickson gave one of his children the middle name “Kuwata”. 

 

Just a small collection of links today, all in English.

• The Tsubamegun guys took a memorable trip to Chiba Marine Stadium.
• Craig Brazell hit two homers and knocked in five runs in Seibu’s 14-5 win over Rakuten.
• I came across this interesting blog post about Japan’s influence on baseball in Brazil.
• Via JapaneseBaseball.com; Rob Fitts’ biography of Wally Yonamine is now on sale. Yonamine was the first post-war American born star in Japanese baseball, and opened the door for others.

In other news, I changed the layout of the site this evening. Let me know if you have any feedback on it.

Sorry for the lack of updates over the last few days… took a little bit of an extended holiday weekend and did a little traveling. Hope my readers in America hada nice 4th of July. Here are today’s bullet points:

• Hanshin is cruising with a 7-game winning streak(link in English) and has opened up a massive 12.5 game lead on 2nd place Chunichi. They’ve also “lit up” their magic number to clinch a playoff spot. It currently stands at 55.
• In other Hanshin news, pitcher Wakatake threw a no-hitter for the Tigers’ farm team.
• Yu Darvish will be starting the All-Star Game for the Pacific League. Colby Lewis gets the call for the Central League.
• MVPs for the month of June. Central League: Kenshin Kawakami (Chunichi), Tomoaki Kanemoto (Hanshin); Pacific League: Hisashi Iwakuma (Rakuten), Craig Brazell (Seibu). Note that a profile on Kawakami is on my to-do list.
• I stumbled across a new English-language Korean Baseball Blog. Here’s a link.
• Deanna at Marinerds, etc posted a blog about her trip to a minor league game in Japan. Lots of good photos.
• In another stumbling, I found this guy’s YouTube page. Tons of game highlights, posted regularly. All videos in Japanese.