Foreign-born players deserve stronger HOF consideration

The question came to me last week from the friend of a friend: Ichiro Suzuki is expected to be a first-ballot Hall of Famer when he becomes eligible. What about other prominent Japanese players such as Hideo Nomo, Hideki Matsui and Yu Darvish? All of them, like Suzuki, played in Japan for a number of years before entering the major leagues. Shouldn’t their achievements in Japan be factored into Hall of Fame consideration?

The question seems simple enough, but the answer is far from simple.

Suzuki spent 19 years in the major leagues where he compiled a .311 lifetime batting average that included 3,089 hits. He stole 509 bases and won 10 Gold Gloves for his brilliance in the outfield. Those are obvious Hall of Fame numbers by themselves.

He doesn’t need the 1,278 hits or 199 stolen bases he recorded in nine seasons in Japan to make his case.

Nomo spent 12 years in the major leagues, compiling a 123-109 record with an ERA of 4.24. He never won more than 16 games in a single season and made only one All-Star Game. Sorry, but that’s not a Hall of Fame resume. Even if we factor in his 7846 mark (3.15 ERA) in Japan’s major leagues he still falls short.

Darvish was 25 years old when he won 16 games as a major league rookie and that remains his career high. He is now in his seventh season and owns 61 career victories. Prior to that he pitched in Japan’s major leagues for seven seasons and his numbers were eye-catching: 93-38 with a 1.99 ERA. Put those numbers with his major league statistics and you get 154-88 and an ERA of 2.70. Those are very nice numbers but not Cooperstownish.

Matsui, however, is a different story. He was nearly 29 years old when he made his major league debut and he drove in 100plus runs in four of his first five seasons before Father Time began to erode his skills. This happened after a 10-year career in Japan when he reached the 100 mark in RBIs five times and just missed on two other occasions. He topped 40 homers three times and drew 100 walks

five times. The Japanese season, by the way, consists of only 140 games.

If Matsui’s Japanese numbers are combined with his major league figures his career totals would be 507 home runs and 1649 RBIs. Anyone who compiled those numbers strictly in our major leagues would be a shoo-in for the Hall.

Instead he was a shooout.

He was eligible for the Hall in 2018 but most voters, including me, weighed only his major league figures and dismissed him as unworthy. There were 422 voters that year and only four placed an x next to his name. That left him well short of the five percent needed to keep his name on the ballot for future elections.

Were we wrong in our judgment? That’s where the issue becomes complicated.

We are voting for the Baseball Hall of Fame. It isn’t called Major League Baseball Hall of Fame or the American Baseball Hall of Fame. It is simply the Baseball Hall of Fame which suggests it should honor greatness wherever baseball is played.

However, the Baseball Writers Association of America’s role is more narrowly defined. A player’s name appears on our ballot five years after he retires and then only if he has played at least 10 years in the major leagues. Those rules would imply that our votes should be based solely on the player’s major league career.

There are other bodies who select managers, umpires, contributors and Negro League players. Our function is limited to major league players and their major league careers. As such, we did the right thing when we excluded Matsui.

And yet, he belongs in the Hall.

So, by the way, does Sadaharu Oh, who slugged 868 homers and drove in 2170 runs during his 22year career with the Yomiuri Giants.

And perhaps a few others, not only from Japan but also, perhaps, from Cuba.

Major League Baseball officials never miss an opportunity to assert that their sport is global. In that case they need to accept the fact that there are cultural, political and economic reasons why great players sometimes remain in the homelands for all or parts of their careers.

Surely some of them are Hall of Fame-worthy. Surely the ones who are should be included.

A FEW STATISTICS (

Wednesday’s games not included): On June 30, 2018 the Yankees were beaten by the Red Sox, 11-0. Since then they have played 195 games without being shut out…Hyun-Jin Ryu of the Dodgers has lowered his ERA to 1.53. The last pitcher to match that number was Dwight Gooden of the Mets who posted a 1.53 in 1985…Phillies catcher J.T. Realmuto has nabbed 31 or 66 would-be base stealers. That’s 47 percent, which leads major league catchers by a wide margin…The Astros are 8-2 in extrainning games…American League clubs have been charged with 1079 errors, which is 70 than have been committed by National League clubs…Charlie Blackmon of the Rockies is batting .418 at home but .245 on the road…The Phillies sent Maikel Franco to the minors last week but he still leads the major leagues in intentional walks with 17.