The Meaning of Ichiro (35 page)

Hir
ka’s appointment as general manager was something of a departure for Japan because most teams chose their GMs from pools of
executives in the parent company, regardless of whether or not they knew anything about baseball. But Lotte’s Akio Shigemitsu,
the Ivy League–educated “deputy owner” of the team, was tired of always being on the bottom rung of the baseball ladder. So
he had opted for innovation to extract his Marines from the morass of mediocrity in which they were mired.

It had been Hir
ka’s idea to import a
gaijin kantoku
to emphasize the fresh beginning Lotte was making. His master plan was to model the organization after an MLB franchise as
much as was reasonably practical within the limits of the Japanese ethos, creating what he called a “revolution of change”
within the organization. He had been studying Valentine for some time and thought he could use him to modernize certain aspects
of his operation. He liked Valentine’s track record and was particularly impressed with his philosophy for handling the pitchers,
to wit: Valentine would not leave a pitcher in longer than 135 pitches per game and always gave his starters at least four
days of rest between outings. It was a philosophy that had been adopted in the 1970s to cope with new levels of offense in
the game and the vastly higher pitch totals this had caused. Hir
ka thought it superior to the tired practice of many Japanese teams of using an ace pitcher in a variety of roles, without
proper rest.

At the same time, becoming the first person with MLB managing experience to pilot a Japanese team appealed to Valentine’s
sense of history, as did the challenge of taking a weak franchise like Lotte and building it up. He agreed to a basic two-year
pact, worth half a million dollars annually with special bonuses for fourth, third, second and first place. He would bring
along his own personal staff to help him implement his program. Included were batting coach Tom Robson, who utilized a special
stop-motion photo technique for analyzing a batter’s swing, and Tom House, Nolan Ryan’s pitching instructor, who was also
the author of several important books on pitching published in the United States.

More important, Hir
ka had given Valentine “full authority.”

“If you don’t like the coaches I give you,” he said, “tell me and I’ll have them replaced.”

He added that, of course, Valentine would be expected to listen to the coaches’ input, because they too had valuable experience
and much to teach. That was why they were there in the first place.

After all, wasn’t the idea to “blend” big-league baseball and Japanese baseball?

“Right,” said Valentine.

“When Hir
ka told me I could run the club my own way,” he said later, “I just assumed that most things would fall under my jurisdiction
or that once things started to jell, management would see the wisdom of a different way.”

Those were, of course, famous last words.

Almost from the beginning, despite goodwill and earnest intentions on both sides, there was conflict. Hir
ka had arranged for the Marines to do their spring training in Peoria, Arizona, starting on February 1—instituting a no-drinking,
no-smoking policy for the duration. Valentine had no problems with that per se, but he programmed an American-style day, which
meant 10:00
A.M.
to 1:30
P.M.
on the practice field, allowing the players to spend the rest of their time at the golf course or swimming pool. Since they
would train every single day, not four on and one off as most Japanese clubs did, three and a half hours at a time in the
blinding Arizona sun was quite enough, Valentine asserted.

This was something that was difficult for Hir
ka’s handpicked coaches to comprehend, accustomed as they were to working morning, afternoon and evening in camp back home.
To them, Valentine’s way, which was the way of every major league team, resembled pregame warm-ups in Japan during the season.

One of the coaches was named Shozo Eto, who came with his own special pedigree. A graduate of Tokyo’s elite Keio University
in 1966, he had played and coached with the Yomiuri Giants for a number of years. Short, stocky, energetic and enthusiastic,
his area of expertise was infield defense, which he had picked up directly from Hir
ka, regarded as one of the best shortstops in NPB history. At Hir
ka’s request, Eto had spent six weeks in the autumn of 1994 drilling Marine players from morning to night in preparation for
the next year’s season, in sessions studiously (if skeptically) attended by Valentine. Eto, it was said, considered himself
a “de facto” head coach, even though he did not actually have the title or the rank.

The other handpicked Hir
ka assistant was Takao Obana, a tall, broad-shouldered former pitcher of some standing who had played under Hir
ka with the Yakult Swallows when that team won the 1978 Japan Championship. Obana had left a comfortable job as a baseball
commentator for Fuji TV’s
Puro-Yaky
Ny
su
to become a field lieutenant for his former boss.