Of course, as the leaves flutter to the ground and turkey goblets fill the air, a fall baseball tradition is also about to be renewed.
The twelve Nippon Professional Baseball teams have started their annual wooing of overseas talent to play in Japan next season. Many who accept offers will surely prepare for the experience in the same way as those who preceded them for 30 years, watching “Mr. Baseball.”
The comedy stars Tom Selleck as Jack Elliot, a former Yankees superstar struggling to regain his greatness. He is called into his manager’s office and told that they shopped him but there was only one taker, the Chunichi Dragons in Japan.
“I’m a Major League player,” says Elliot. “There’s no way I’m playing in Japan.”
He does, and thus begins his journey into a peculiar new world, where shoes aren’t allowed in the clubhouse, toilet seats are too small for him, and sluggers are sometimes expected to decay, everything. this, according to an unscientific poll of foreigners who have played there recently, is still true today.
The movie was released to limited success thirty years ago this fall, but it’s become a go-to resource for gamers who want to know what they’re getting into.
While the image of a player being dumped in Japan doesn’t mesh well with the realities of foreign players in Japan – Miles Mikolas, Ryan Brasier and Colby Lewis are among recent examples of young players who went to Japan and returned to the States -United. baseball with success – the depiction of a world that seems upside down at first glance for Elliot de Selleck is accurate according to those who watched the film to prepare for their journey.
“Absolutely,” said Nick Martinez, a relief pitcher who spent several seasons in Japan before signing with the San Diego Padres this season and playing a starring role in the bullpen that led San Diego. in the National League Championship Series.
In a scene from “Mr. Baseball,” Selleck’s character questions the value of a conditioning exercise he’s never seen in which players squat low and try to step forward down the field with their legs spread wide.
“What is this?” he asks Hammer, his team’s veteran suketto, or foreign player, played by Dennis Haysbert. When told that it was a common exercise, he retorted: “For what, a Russian dance competition?
