On Thursday in Newport Beach, California, agent Scott Boras described Nippon Professional Baseball as Major League Baseball’s developmental opposite — an environment where minor leaguers get special attention and focus in a nurturing environment that puts the North American minors to shame.
In some ways he was right and some ways he was overstating the case. The SoftBank Hawks — whom pitcher Carter Stewart has signed with — fit this description, but they are far from the norm.
SoftBank isn’t the same as NPB
The Hawks are unusual in Japan, the only one of Japan’s 12 pro clubs to even consider the possibility that their team could evolve into being best in the world. But while Boras talked about how advanced the development system in Japan is, he was really talking about SoftBank.
Boras had it right when he praised the standard of living in NPB’s minor leagues. Every team’s players are fed well and earn real wages, allowing them to really focus on baseball. For players who are humble, serious and smart enough to know what they want, it is a superb environment to develop in.
At the press conference, Stewart spoke about how impressed he was with Shohei Ohtani. During his time with the Nippon Ham Fighters, Ohtani was absolutely devoted to developing his craft, constantly working and training and seldom venturing out of the dorm.
Japan is big on discipline
For some players, however, it can be a road to nowhere. Japanese coaches are inclined to demand orthodox playing styles, while most teams — SoftBank is currently one of the exceptions — do not instruct players in proper weight training or nutrition. Most teams follow the old school dogma that running is the best way to build bodies for baseball, that weight training is a Pandora’s box, and that the only necessary nutrition comes from eating a lot.
And while living conditions are safe compared to the squalor that passes for normal in the North American minor leagues, young Japanese minor leaguers live in spartan dormitories, with strict rules and curfews.
This is all normal stuff for Japanese kids, many of whom have been living in team dormitories since high school, and who are used to following every order from a coach to the letter. In such an environment, kids who lack confidence can find themselves trying to play in ways that match a coach’s philosophy but don’t get the most out of their individual skills.
The Orix BlueWave tried to do that to Ichiro Suzuki in 1992 and 1993, trying to turn him into a guy who only bunts and slaps the ball to the left side of the infield despite the fact that he was head-and-shoulders above every minor league hitter in Japan as an 18-year-old.
Those who embrace Japan can flourish
For those reasons alone, Japan is not easy. Add to those a language barrier and a baseball cultural barrier and it is harder. But those who are willing to take whatever comes and humble themselves to the task of learning, Japanese baseball offers things that minor league baseball cannot.
Japan can teach a lot simply by not being American in approach. Pitchers have to learn different ways to strike out hitters because there is a subclass of hitters who are only trying to foul pitches off until they can slap it to the left side of the infield. You can’t just bury a two-strike slider and get a swing and miss because most batters won’t bite. Adjusting to that is an education.
Boras mentioned all of Japan’s current major league starting pitchers. Not all have established themselves as huge stars, but they have one thing in common. They all locate their secondary pitches well and all field their positions extremely well. Those things are considered basics in Japan. Stewart will do more PFP (pitchers fielding practice) in four months this year with SoftBank than he’d do in four years in the North American minors. Becoming accustomed to the preparation demanded here is different, and that too is an education.
Stewart said he recognized Japanese players’ passion for baseball and discipline. While some of that an artifact of an authoritarian system, baseball here is not so different from baseball anywhere else. Respectful players who are passionate about learning will find coaches who are passionate about teaching. And because the focus of the game here is a little different, a little more small ball than in the States, there are things to learn here that coaches won’t teach you back home.
Those differences are an education.
But Japan isn’t a baseball superpower
The way Boras spoke about NPB’s development prowess, one would expect to see Japanese talent overrunning MLB. But it ain’t happening.
A small measure of the reason for that can be laid at NPB’s doorstep — particularly the historical hesitation to teach players weight training and proper nutrition. But the real culprit is an amateur system that wipes out the best players at an early age through injury and authoritarian training methods.
Elementary and junior high school pitchers throw excessively until their arms are damaged beyond repair by the time they reach high school. A large number of Japan’s best pro arms don’t take up pitching until late in high school or university.
A lot of kids are also burned out by the excessive year-round practice and the endless running. Rui Hachimura, who is expected to go high in the next NBA draft, loved baseball as a boy growing up in Toyama Prefecture, but the mind-numbing soul-sapping practice that is considered proper by old-school coaches drove him away.
A lot of Japanese pro pitchers still throw marathon bullpens, because that is what they are accustomed to. However, few pro teams now think it is a practice that leads to improved pitching.
Japanese pro baseball gets players who were not the best athletes of their elementary and junior high school teams because those kids are culled from the herd by antiquated practices. But it is doing much better with the players it gets than it did two decades ago.
