Now he’s pitching to greens instead of batters
Former Angels reliever Hasegawa is excelling in a new sport, golf
Shigetoshi Hasegawa made a career of going one on one against the American League’s most intimidating sluggers during nine major league seasons spent mostly as a middle reliever.
All of 5 feet 11 and 170 pounds, the former Angel and Seattle Mariner went at guys like Barry Bonds, Albert Belle and Frank Thomas without ever backing down. He was always aggressive, always confident that, even though he didn’t have an overpowering fastball, he could get anyone out.
When he left baseball after the 2005 season, he had compiled a 45-43 record and 3.70 earned-run average. He was selected to the AL AllStar team in 2003, a season in which he converted 16 of 17 save opportunities for the Mariners.
But all of that might have been child’s play when compared to the competitive odds he’ll be facing next week.
Hasegawa, 49, will play in the 117th U.S. Amateur golf championship, generally regarded as the most prestigious amateur golf tournament in the world. More than 7,000 golfers tried to qualify for a spot in the field of 312; Hasegawa made it by shooting two under par for two rounds at his home course, Mission Viejo Country Club, on July 24.
The weeklong U.S. Amateur will be held at Riviera and Bel-Air Country Clubs beginning Monday. Two rounds of stroke play on Monday and Tuesday at both courses will cut the field to 64 players. They move on to match play the rest of the week at Riviera.
It has become, more than anything, a young man’s championship, for many the final step to a professional career. The average age of the field is barely 22. And no one over the age of 24 has won the event since 1993.
Still, Hasegawa, who looks as fit as he did in his playing days and maintains the same light-hearted demeanor that made him popular with teammates and fans, is hopeful he can make it to match play. Once there, he figures, anything can happen.
“I’ve played in tournaments with a lot of the young guys,” Hasegawa said recently after an early-morning round at his home club. “They can hit it very long. I’m pretty long too, but now I just try to hit it 280 down the middle.
“The important thing for me is to keep tension out of it, keep an even temper. In baseball, you can get very excited; in golf, you can’t. If I can stay at 60% or 70% all week, I’ll be OK.”
Hasegawa isn’t the oldest player with California ties playing next week. Robby Funk, 54, of Canyon Lake, got into the field by being low amateur at the U.S. Senior Open in early July. He was the only amateur to make the cut after he dropped a six-foot putt for par at the end of his second round, a putt that left Nick Faldo one shot above the cut line.
In Hasegawa’s mind, keeping an even keel and relying on his skills will be much more important than his opponent … if he gets to match play.
“I’m still running a lot, lifting weights for golf,” he said. “It doesn’t really matter who I’m playing; an amateur is an amateur. I don’t care if he played in the British Amateur or whatever. I pitched against guys built like this [spreading his arms well beyond his shoulders]; it’s not a big deal.”
Hasegawa was a starter for the Orix Blue Wave in Japan for six years before signing with the Angels before the 1997 season, the first Japanese player on their 40man roster. He pitched in Anaheim for five seasons before signing with Seattle in 2002 as a free agent.
He didn’t start playing golf until he was 22 and became an adequate player during his baseball days, shooting in the 80s. But five years ago, he decided to get serious, planning to try to compete at least occasionally in events on the senior tour once he turned 50. He contacted Shintaro Ishiyama, who runs the P.Fit Golf Studio in Irvine and has worked with several Japanese professionals.
“He’s a former professional athlete, so he has power,” Ishiyama said. “If he really swings, his club head speed is 120 mph; that’s up there with Tiger Woods. It’s still about 115 when he swings easy. I was very surprised at how strong he is; he looks skinny, but he’s very fit.”
Ishiyama worked intently with Hasegawa on his short game.
“When he came to me, he had only one simple chipping stroke, so his scoring was inconsistent,” he said. “We worked on different techniques, and that has really helped him around the greens.”
Hasegawa’s power didn’t come from swinging a bat. He played in 677 games in Japan and the American League and had only one official plate appearance. But several movements in pitching transfer well to golf.
“The weight shift and the motion are very close to the golf swing,” Ishiyama said. “I think that was a real advantage for him. And being a pitcher makes him very strong mentally too.
“He has enough guts to compete against any opponent. His mental skills are very advanced.”
Other pitchers have also become good competitive golfers. Ralph Terry, Rick Rhoden and Erik Hanson all played in USGA championship events, though never in the Amateur.
Hasegawa has been a fast learner. “Most players, they can work on only one thing at a time,” Ishiyama said. “Shiggy can work on three things at once, shallow angle at impact, weight shift, hitting from the inside, whatever. I can tell him what he needs to do and he does it right away.”
Hasegawa tried unsuccessfully to qualify for the Amateur the previous two years. He didn’t have the necessary skills two years ago and last year was hurt. He works as a senior advisor for the Orix Buffaloes, finding American players for the Japanese baseball team.
“I try to play or practice in the mornings, then go into the office to research American players,” he said. “I’m really very busy these days.”
He has also worked with Angels pitchers in spring training as a special instructor. There’s occasionally time for golf too.
“I’ve seen him swing a golf club,” Angels manager Mike Scioscia said. “He kills the ball . . . .
“I can tell you, if he’s got the same makeup sitting over a seven-foot putt as he did when he was on the mound, he’s not going to scare off, he’s going to sink it. He’s got a great makeup.”
Mike Trout has played with Hasegawa several times.
“He’s good,” Trout said. “He’s fun to play with, very outgoing, funny guy . . . .
“He beats me all the time.”
Everyone who knows Hasegawa calls him Shiggy, the nickname that led to Will Smith’s “Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It” being played as his theme song when he walked to the mound.
But he wasn’t Shiggy to everyone in New York. Bob Sheppard, for more than half a century the public address announcer at Yankee Stadium, said that other than Mickey Mantle, the name he found most enjoyable to announce because of its cadence and the way it rolled off the tongue was Shigetoshi Hasegawa.
“So I guess,” Hasegawa said, laughing, “that’s why I’m a little famous.”