Ichiro Suzuki: Japanese power player – Part 1
Since the news of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami, the whole world has been devastated. People with relatives in Japan are frantically trying to contact their families, but one of the unlucky ones who has not been able to do that is Seattle Mariners’
Ichiro Suzuki. With nothing to do other than hope for the best, let’s take a look back at his career and all the records he’s made and broken.
The first thing anyone notices about a baseball player is his uniform number. Avid baseball fans would recognise that the number Ichiro was given is the same as that of pitching star Randy Johnson, which is 51. At first he was hesitant about this as the
receiving of this number would mean that the expectations from him would only increase. He personally messaged Johnson letting him know that he would not bring shame to the uniform.
Ichiro was one of the first Japanese players to play regularly for MLB. Even during his career in Japan, Ichiro was doubted because of his size, he was deemed too small to play baseball so those fears were only made bigger when he came to America to play
MLB. Stakeholders were worried that his small body built would not be able to endure the longer 162-game season. But all these worries were set to rest once and for all, when Ichiro showed that he had tremendous throwing potential by gunning down Oakland’s
Terrence Long. This throw was later dubbed as The Throw by the Japanese media.
From there onwards started Ichiro’s journey, which left the critics and fans alike, stunned by the potential he possesses. He started off with a .350 batting average and 56 stolen bases which broke Jackie Robinsons record which was set in 1949. His first
season was met with him receiving the honour of being on a popular sports magazine, a hitting streak of 23 and 21 games and heavy media attention from both sides of the Pacific.
Later in the season he won the American League Most Valuable Player and Rookie of the Year Awards. The winning of both these awards in the same season broke Fred Lynns record. No MLB star has received both honours in the same season except for these two.
Since he seemed almost unstoppable it’s rumored that before the 2001 game between the Seattle Mariners and the New York Yankees, their manager Joe Torre told his Yankee players to not let Ichiro beat them because he’s the key to Seattle’s offense.
In the 2002-03 seasons he was the first Mariners player and sixth MLB player in history to have 200-plus hits in two consecutive seasons. He led the All-Star balloting for the second year simultaneously. In 2003 he became the third player in history to start
off his career with three 200-hit seasons. Like expected he finished on top for his hits, batting average, steals and runs. Once again, he was elected to his third All-Star game.
It seems that since starting off in MLB Ichiro was having one flawless season after the other, but the 2004 season was his record setting one. He started by breaking George Sislers 84-year-old record when he had the most hits in one season. This season he
had his best offense, recorded 50 hits in four months and become the first ever to have four in a season.
Later he hit his 2000th professional hit in US and Japan combined and by the end of September his total stood at 256 hits. According to Ichiro it was the greatest moment of his career when he finally hit his 258th hit of the year, breaking
Sislers record and being given a standing ovation from the fans and players present in the stadium, as well as Sislers’ daughter.
The next record he broke was his own when he finished the 2004 season with 262 hits, the maximum in US and Japanese baseball. Since 2001 he has 924 hits, which is more than anyone else’s over a four year period and he broke yet another record of Bill Terry
who had 918 accumulated hits in between 1929 and 1932. With such successful seasons, did he have more to offer?
Continued in Part 2
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