Come back Boriskov!

Doesn't that even sound stupid? Come back Boriskov? It sounds like something Sylvester Stallone would star in. Yet, like Obi Wan, Boriskov was my only hope.

Last year, I started religiously following Japanese Baseball. Finding the scores was easy enough, and I can still do that. The problem is the stats. Boriskov's now deceased geocities page was the only place on the internet that had the stats in English, and without him, I felt completely lost. You may notice one sidebar link that still works and has some stats for my Hanshin Tigers, the Tigers Today page, which is probably the first website in history dedicated to how well Ryan Vogelsong and Esteban Yan are doing.

The closest thing we have is JapanBaseball.com's rudimentary stats page. I applaud the moderator (who I think goes by michaelbaystars) for taking this measure, but it still leaves out so much context. Weak hitters, Weak pitchers. I can't tell these things from a leaderboard. All I can tell is that Hanshin has struggled early to find consistent pitching and that Kanemoto is a badass. They also have a message board, which led to this post by Baseball Prospectus SABR Japan guy Mike Plugh:

He replied to me. Very cryptic and grim. It sounded like something terrible has happened, but I didn't pry. I don't think he's planning to resurface anytime soon unfortunately. I send my prayers out to him for whatever he's dealing with.

So I had been planning a huge analysis, predictions; everything. For a long time now. But without the stats, it's kinda meaningless, eh? You'll just have to settle for the fun factoid that on this day in 2003, Shingo Takatsu set the NPB saves record. Because all I can look up is past events.

Come back Borisov!

Quoth Japanese Baseball Daily

The night before, as a celebration for this phase of spring training ending, Jeff Williams, Esteban Yan, Ryan Vogelsong and their translator went to a team party dressed in Japanese schoolgirl outfits as a prank. Ugh! And where did they get ones big enough to fit what are in Japan three huge dudes?

This is right up there with the Tommy Lasorda call-girl incident as far as things I did not need to know about.

Japanese Baseball: Matsuzaka and Saito have a duel for the ages

Pacific League Playoffs
Seibu 1, Softbank 0 - Both Kazumi Saito and Daisuke Matsuzaka came into this game dealing, and it was a true pitchers duel as Kazuhiro Wada doubled in the games only run in the seventh when Hiroyumi Nakajima and Alex Cabrera strung together back-to-back singles with nobody out. Both pitchers threw a complete game, Saito went eight, giving up four hits and two walks, while striking out nine. Matsuzaka went all nine, yielding just six hits and striking out thirteen and hitting four different batters. Sadaharu Oh decided to seperate his best hitters out while letting Jolbert Cabrera bat third, and Jolbert left five runners on base.

Central League Playoff Push
Hanshin 5, Yomiuri 3 - Hanshin put up a furious rally in the eighth to win their ninth out of ten and pull within two of the Chunichi Dragons in the CL. Tomoaki Kanemoto hit his twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth homers of the year, including a three-run shot in the eighth to break up a 2-2 tie. Kyuji Fujikawa gave up a run in the ninth to raise his ERA to 0.7, but picked up his seventeenth save. Yoshinobu Takahashi hit his fifteenth homer in the top of the eighth to tie the game for the Giants.

Yokohama 3, Chunichi 2 - Dragons manager Hisashi Yamada played the percentages and got burned in the eighth. With a 2-0 lead, he brought in LHP Masato Kobayashi to face three left-handed hitters in a row, and despite walking the first, he had gotten a strikeout and a quick popup. He then turned to RHP Shinya Okamoto (4-1), as there were three right-handed hitters in a row. Okamoto walked the first batter, then gave up a three-run game losing homer to Shuuichi Murata (33rd). Marc Kroon picked up the save for the Bay Stars, his twenty-sixth. Chunichi's magic number stayed at four.

Hiroshima 4, Yakult 3 - In a game dominated by ex-MLB players, the Swallows jumped off to a 3-1 lead off a homer by Adam Riggs, his thirty-eighth (good for third place in the CL). Alex Ramirez hit his twenty-fifth homer, a three-run bomb that made a loser out of Masaki Hayamashi (2-4). Shinjo Takatsu picked up his thirteenth save with a shaky (1 bb, 1 h) ninth.

Baseball around the World, 9/31/06

MLB

Two new pennant winners guaranteed as Astros hand division crown to 83-78 Cardinals - Perhaps Roger Clemens should have started on one days rest. EVERYONE KNOWS HE'S ON THE ROIDS AFTER ALL.

Tigers roll over, hand division to Twins, 1st pick to Devil Rays - There may be a day when a team gets back-to-back #1 overall picks, but not this year. A squad that consisted of David DeJesus batting third and Emil Brown hitting cleanup dropped four on Fernando Rodney in the eight and two on Kenny Rogers in the twelfth to allow the Royals to finish at exactly 100 losses.

Padres win division crown, set playoff date with St. Louis for second consecutive year - Brandon Webb was lit up for seven runs in four innings as the Padres took home the NL West crown for a second consecutive year, both with under 90 wins. Trevor Hoffman tried really hard to blow it by allowing 2 homers in the ninth, but with the aid of a questionable call at second, got his 46th save.

Playoff Matchups:
AL
Tigers @ Yankees G1 Tuesday 8 ET
Athletics @ Twins G1 Tuesday 1 ET

NL
Dodgers @ Mets G1 Wednesday 4 ET
Cardinals @ Padres G1 Tuesday 4 ET

Nippon Central League

Chunichi @ Hanshin - After a 7-1 win to bring the Chunichi Dragons lead back to 3 games yesterday, today's game was rained out. The Dragons magic number is 7.

Yakult 9, Yokohama 4 - Takumi Nasuno (3-8) got blown up, allowing the Swallows to romp to an easy win. The lone homer in the contest was by veteran SS Noriykui Shiroishi, it was his 21st career in over 10 seasons.

Hiroshima 3, Yomiuri 0 - A group effort by Hiroshimas pen after a spot start by Saitou (1-0), four other relivers combined on the six hit shutout. Yomiuri's promising young Chiang (3-2) went 8, allowing only 1 earned run, to take the loss. WBC Hero S Y Lee was held to a 1-4 by the Carp, dropping him to a tie for second in the batting race at .319 (well, it's not much of a race, Fukudome is batting .357).

Dutch Series

Pioneers scored one in the first, but Kinheim has turned this game into a laugher with two innings to play by dropping four in the second and six more in the third. Roger Kops is sure to take the loss after allowing six runs in two plus innings. Check it out live here.

Update: Despite lack of scoreboard updates, Kinheim has won the game 13-5 and are the Dutch League Champions. Congratulations, Dirk Van't Klooster!

Japanese Baseball Update - A Dicky Gonzalez sighting!

Rakuten picks high school fastballer Tanaka in draft- Apparently the Japanese draft system is just a little different from ours. In the first round, every team may select any player, and then through a complex lottery (with records and all that), players claimed by multiple teams are awarded to one team for exclusive negotiation rights. Teams that fail to recieve the player get an alternate pick, which may also be subject to lottery. Tanaka was named on the most bids in the first round, with 4. He throws around 95 and in his free time, has a thing for grafitti. Naoichi Domoue was selected by three different clubs and awarded to Chunichi, despite being a shortstop who hit fifty-five homers in high school.


Somewhere, the Japanese version of this man is screaming at people about this.

The standings in the CL show us a two team race down the stretch:
CL
Chunichi 75-49-5, .605, -- (M# 12)
Hanshin 75-55-4, .577, 3
Yakult 64-64-2, .500, 13
Yomiuri 62-71-2, .466, 17.5
Hiroshima 56-70-5, .444, 20
Yokohama 52-76-3, .406, 25

In Chunichi's last game, they were stifled by Dicky Gonzalez, who pitched a four-hitter to win 4-1. The amazing Kosuke Fukudome provided the only offense for the Dragons, a solo shot in the second inning. He is leading the CL in batting average (.356), OBP (.441), OPS (1.110), doubles (40), and runs (105).

In the PL, where the season ends a little earlier because they actually HAVE a playoff system, we're looking at this:
x-Seibu 79-53-2, .598 -- (M# 2)
x-Nippon Ham 80-54-0 .597 0.0
x-Softbank 75-53-5 .586 2.0
Lotte 63-69-1 .477 16.0
Orix 51-80-3 .389 27.5
Rakuten 45-83-4 .352 32.0

Bobby Valentine's squadron will not be defending their title this year. Seibu has 2 games left, Nippon Ham and Softbank have 3, 2 of which are against each other. Lets all root against Seibu, who are best known for unleashing Kaz Matsui on the American mainland. Those sick bastards.

Either way, with all three having already clinched, expect a playoff preview sometime in the near future. The rest of the season is still VERY important, because after seeing it's top two teams lose in it's first two years of adopting a playoff system, the Pacific League has guaranteed the winner of the regular season both the bye, homefield, AND one free win in a best-of-five.

Also, I'd be remiss if I didn't give a shout out to Dragons P Masahiro Yamamoto for becoming the oldest player in Japanese baseball history to throw a no-hitter, 3-0 over Hanshin. Yamamoto, 41, held the Tigers without a hit or a walk (the perfect game was ruined by an error). Hanshin is relying heavily on other teams to help them win the CL, as they are a pathetic 5-13-1 against the front-running Dragons.