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Yu Darvish, who has been tearing up Japan's Pacific League, could be bringing his big-time arm to the major leagues
Japan's top pitcher has folks asking ... who are Yu?
BY Anthony Mccarron
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Saturday, November 5 2011, 2:36 PM
Frederic J. Brown/GettyAce pitcher Yu Darvish could go through Japan's posting system and land in MLB.
The best pitcher in the world who is not in the majors is a half-Japanese, half-Iranian wunderkind who is almost two months younger than Phil Hughes.
He has been tearing up Japan’s Pacific League since he was 18, building a following not only for his strikeouts, but for his striking good looks and a rock star-like off-the-field resume that includes a marriage to an actress, a high-school suspension after a magazine snapped a photo of him smoking in a pachinko parlor (a Japanese gaming machine house) and his own nude photo spread in a popular women's magazine.
This winter, Yu Darvish, the 25-year-old righthander who plays for the Nippon-Ham Fighters, could be taking his splendid arm to the major leagues. And if Darvish goes through Japan's posting system, in which big-league teams bid for the right to negotiate to sign him, he could give some lucky team a young, instant ace.
“He’s the real deal,” says ex-Yankee Darrell Rasner, who has spent the last three years pitching against Darvish for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles in the Pacific League. “He’s the best pitcher there, in my opinion, and he’d do well in the States. He’s got a winning mentality.
“He seemed to toy with guys in Japan sometimes. When he needs to dial it up, he can really go after somebody with strikeout stuff. I’ve seen him add velocity late, get his fastball up to 96-plus (miles per hour) with guys in scoring position and strike out a couple of hitters.”
The 6-foot-5 Darvish was terrific in the 2009 World Baseball Classic, the first extended look American fans got of him, unless you count YouTube. Darvish was 2-1 with a 2.08 ERA for Japan, the eventual WBC champion. He is also the only pitcher in Nippon Professional Baseball history to have a sub-2.00 ERA for five consecutive seasons, including a 1.44 ERA this year when he was 18-6.
“The potential, it’s all there,” says Harold Reynolds, the former All-Star who is now an analyst for MLB Network and saw Darvish pitch in the WBC. “He can be a frontline starter and he’d have a lot of interest here.
“I’d be shocked if the Red Sox and the Yankees were not in it, particularly the Yankees,” Reynolds added. “You look at the Yankees, the state of their pitching. If he’s everything people say he is, and he lives up to it, he can be a dominating force in your rotation for five or six years.”
It’s still unclear whether Darvish will ask Nippon-Ham to post him or if the team will do it. He was quoted saying a few weeks ago that he had not yet made a decision. But Darvish already has an agent to represent him in dealings with major-league clubs — Arn Tellem, who represents Hideki Matsui — and is working with Don Nomura, who handles Darvish’s affairs in Japan.
Many in baseball believe Darvish will pitch in the majors next season. One major league executive who spoke on condition of anonymity pointed to the parade of scouts and executives going to Japan to watch Darvish — Rasner remembers seeing them dot the stands on nights the flashy righy pitched — as an indication that most teams believe Darvish will leave Japan. At least two general managers, Texas’ Jon Daniels and Toronto’s Alex Anthopoulos, traveled to Japan to watch him.
“I do think he’s coming,” said the executive, who has watched Darvish multiple times. “Because of the high-profile personnel that went there, and there’s not a lot of high-level pitching in this free-agent market. Maybe that encourages Darvish to make the move.”
But several baseball executives wondered if the Red Sox and Yankees’ struggles with recent Japanese imports — Daisuke Matsuzaka and Kei Igawa — might scare off some suitors. Neither pitcher now seems worth their price tags — $103 million for Matsuzaka, more than $46 million for Igawa.
Darvish, though, is younger than both pitchers were when they came to the majors and, some executives say, he has not had the same high workload that Matsuzaka had already endured. Plus, one says, “He’s better than Matsuzaka. His body is unique and he added some good weight over the last year (about 20 pounds to get to about 200 pounds). The talent level is very high-end.
“He pitches with a lot of intellect for a guy who is that young. He knows the situation, the scoreboard, the hitters. With no one on, he’s throwing 91 and then if there’s second and third, he’s throwing 95 and trying to make you swing and miss. It’s not flamethrower, flamethrower. It’s pitcher. That’s pretty advanced for that age.”
Of course, Darvish will have to prove he can overcome the challenges that face any Japanese pitcher who plays in the majors. In addition to living in an unfamiliar culture where few in the organization speak your native language, Japanese pitchers must contend with technical differences in the game.
The two places play with different baseballs — the seams are higher on Japanese balls, making it easier to attain the tight spin that makes breaking balls effective. The strike zones are different. The mounds are slightly higher and less firm in Japan than they are in the majors, a second executive familiar with the Japanese game says.
The travel, as well as the lineups, are more punishing in the majors, too, and pitchers start only once a week in Japan. They do much more throwing in side sessions and neither Matsuzaka nor Igawa reacted well to changes in his routine.
“The team in Japan controls everything for the Japanese player, even when you’re sleeping,” the second executive says. “They tell you when to train, what to eat. If you go from that to the fairly free MLB teams, that’s radical. And when you’re put in an environment where nobody speaks the language, no one understands your jokes, how you grew up, it’s difficult.”
Darvish, however, may be uniquely qualified to adapt. He is the son of an Iranian father and Japanese mother who met at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Fla., so he’s always been a little bit different growing up in Japan. He’s embraced the spotlight of being a star pitcher, too, vowing to let fans know via Twitter if he asks Nippon-Ham to post him.
“He’s already encountered some things outside the norm,” says the first executive. “I know this player is comfortable in his own skin.”
“I know he’s smooth,” adds Rasner. “I don’t know how he goes out, he’s such a big star there. He’s always under the gun and people are always watching him, but he’s always handled himself well.”
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