Ichiro -- discuss

OK, maybe I'm wrong, but it was worth throwing it out there for debate.

You've got a career .333 hitter who's also one of the best defensive players ever vs. a career .278 hitter who's certainly not known for defense, seems at least worthy of argument. But I admit I didn't think it through much beyond that.

Still, there is that giant who knows with the missing years at the front of Ichiro's career.

 

Not when you consider everything else Rickey did that Ichiro doesn't.

And I wouldn't call Ichiro one of the best defensive players ever.

 

Yeah, Ichiro was right at the beginning of his prime when he arrived in the U.S. Even if you add seven years to the beginning of his career --- so that he reaches the majors at age 20, just as Henderson did --- and extrapolate the stats out so that he gets a little better every year until 2001, he's still not better than Henderson.

Longevity is a major part of Henderson's greatness, but his peak as an offensive was still far higher than Ichiro's.

 

At risk of getting beat down again, why not?

The guy has won the gold glove award every single year he's played, he's got a Clemente-esque cannon arm and he's fast as a whippet running down balls. Hard to imagine that many guys have ever played his position better than he has.

 

That's a hell of a lot of cliches for one sentence, fanboi.

 

And that's not an answer.

And I believe it's the first time I've ever had the fanboi accusation thrown my way. If I'm an Ichiro fanboi, then I can assure you've I've hid it damn well before now.

 

This is the first time you made Ichiro souond like the greatest freaking player who ever lived.

He's very good. He's an absolute Hall of Famer. But most of your posts about him today are way over the top.

 

Can't say I agree. Ichiro's best seasons in Japan were actually in the mid-90. He won three straight MVPs from 94-96 and I believe his final seasons there were slightly under that, and his AL MVP came in his first season here. There's a LOT of his prime that we never saw.

 

Ichiro Suzuki (I do so hate the whole "first name, man!" thing he has on his jersey. Nice ego, there) is a surefire Hall of Famer.

Probably shouldn't have been AL Rookie of the Year in 2001, as he was no rookie.

That said, it's tough to quantify his Japan League stats. That is a league where Tuffy Rhodes challenged the season homer record, after all.

 

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=lukas/041216

Quoting:
So why did Ichiro wear "Ichiro" while playing for the Orix Blue Wave in Japan? Michael Westbay, system administrator of the excellent JapaneseBaseball.com, explains:

"Suzuki is a common name, and when Ohgi-kantoku took over as manager of the team in 1994, he assigned an unknown kid his first name on the back of his uniform: Ichiro. This was done under the guise of 'fan service,' to promote more interest in the team ... Ichiro became a household name that year, as he became the first player to break the 200-hit barrier in Japanese baseball history."

 

Let's dispense with this idea that Henderson's greatness was about longevity. Take away his last 10 seasons and he would still have been a Hall of Famer.

Suzuki (I'm with Piotr. I hate that first-name only thing) may have a .333 batting average, but even with that Henderson had the higher on base percentage.

The following are their 162-game average seasons according to baseballreference.com.

Henderson: .279 average, .401 on-base, .419 slugging percentage, 16 home runs, 59 RBI, 121 runs scored, 74 stolen bases.

Suzuki: 333, .379 OBP, .434 slugging, nine home runs, 58 RBI, 111 runs scored, 39 steals.

Henderson also stole over 100 bases three times, including the record 130 in 1982. He also has two World Series rings to none for Suzuki. He had an OPS over 1.000 twice in his career. Suzuki's best is .869 in 2004.

It's really not that close.

 

Whatever. Ramirez is a common name as well, but you don't see Manny Ramirez wearing "Manny" on his jersey.

And however it started, it still doesn't mean he had to wear his first name on the back of his jersey when he came to the states. It's an ego/marketing thing, just like with Brazilian soccer players.