MESA, Ariz. — Ichiro Suzuki is a sinewy 5 toes 11 inches and 170 kilos, whereas Mike Trout is a stout 6-2, 235. They signify wildly completely different physique sorts and taking part in kinds, however their distinctive skills converged in influencing the profession path of Seiya Suzuki.
After simply two weeks with the Chicago Cubs, although, Suzuki is doing so much to create his personal identification.
On opening day, the outfielder was thrown into the fireplace towards Corbin Burnes of the Milwaukee Brewers — the Nationwide League’s reigning Cy Younger Award winner — and he produced a single and a stroll, which isn’t any small feat towards a pitcher recognized for his pinpoint management.
“I had by no means seen a pitch like that earlier than, nevertheless it excited me,” Suzuki advised Japanese reporters of Burnes’s minimize fastball. “I used to be like, ‘Wow, there are pitchers that may do that right here?’ The power and motion of the ball was shocking and easily one thing I had by no means seen.”
Excited? Sure. Deterred? By no means.
Since his debut, Suzuki has continued to radiate, taking part in proper discipline and batting in the midst of the Cubs’ order. He homered in back-to-back video games at Pittsburgh, had gone deep twice extra by way of Thursday and had collected 12 R.B.I., together with 13 walks, two of which have been intentional. He was main the majors with a .520 on-base share.
Whereas they share a surname, Suzuki isn’t associated to Ichiro Suzuki, the longtime Seattle Mariners star who had his personal scintillating debut in 2001. Ichiro Suzuki’s stellar first season earned him the uncommon mixture of being each most useful participant and rookie of the 12 months — making him the one one of many 16 place gamers to come back over from Japan to be named his league’s prime rookie. (Shohei Ohtani, a two-way star, additionally was, in 2018.)
The 2022 M.L.B. Season
A season that was unsure is all of the sudden in full gear.
The seventeenth place participant from Japan, after all, is Seiya Suzuki, and his .343 batting common by way of 13 video games makes comparisons to Ichiro Suzuki pretty apparent.
These comparisons have been coming since Seiya was chosen out of highschool by the Hiroshima Carp within the second spherical of the 2012 draft. Instantly, he was nicknamed the “red-helmeted Ichiro,” a reference to the loudly coloured headgear of Carp batters. He was additionally initially given the identical uniform quantity as Ichiro, 51, earlier than ultimately accepting No. 1 for the 2019 season, a prestigious honor with the Carp.
Similar to Ichiro, the youthful Suzuki’s journey to proper discipline started on a highschool pitcher’s mound, the place he reached 92 miles per hour on radar weapons. However Hiroshima coveted his offensive potential and started creating him as an infielder. He bounced round between positions throughout call-ups in 2013 and 2014, however by 2016, at age 21, he was the Carp’s beginning proper fielder.
The younger Suzuki’s battle to safe a place caught the attention of Hiroki Kuroda, who had pitched in america, together with with the Yankees from 2012 to 2014. It led to career-changing recommendation — and a shift in strategy. The red-helmeted Ichiro would attempt to get extra out of his muscular physique.
“I used to be so completely consumed with establishing myself and preventing for a job with the Carp again then that American baseball was the farthest factor from my thoughts,” Suzuki defined not too long ago in his native Japanese. “However Kuroda San seen me and advised me a couple of participant over there who I reminded him of with an analogous construct and talent set. He advised me if I labored arduous, I could possibly be like him.”
Kuroda had simply rejoined the Carp after seven seasons and 79 wins for the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Yankees. The participant he was referencing to encourage Suzuki? The Angels’ Trout — thought-about by many to be one of many best all-around gamers in baseball historical past.
Kuroda’s encouragement made a right away influence.
“I began looking for video of this man,” Suzuki defined. “When I discovered it, I used to be mesmerized by his expertise. He may run, he may throw, he may hit, and he had energy. For Kuroda San to inform me I had it inside myself to grow to be that form of participant was so inspiring. It gave me nice motivation on the precise time I wanted it most. It influenced my coaching, my weight-reduction plan, and my entire strategy. I turned a lot extra targeted on changing into that man.”
By the point Kuroda retired in 2016, after two seasons as Suzuki’s teammate, Trout had received two of his three M.V.P. awards and been voted to 5 consecutive All-Star Video games — a streak now at 9. Reached in Japan by telephone, Kuroda defined what he noticed within the younger Suzuki to make such a comparability.
“I do know I set the bar excessive,” Kuroda mentioned in Japanese. “However they’re each right-handed-hitting outfielders with an analogous construct. Clearly, I’m not a batter, however once I take a look at Seiya Suzuki from a pitcher’s perspective, I see a extremely powerful out. Past that, you could have the time period ‘five-tool participant’ in America, and that’s precisely what he’s. Not only a proficient batter, however he excels in all the talents required of a place participant. That full package deal with that physique sort jogged my memory of Trout.”
Kuroda was additional enthralled by the best way Suzuki took his recommendation to coronary heart.
“All I did was discover his potential and provides him a aim, albeit a excessive one,” he mentioned. “He had the drive and the will to pursue it. Along with his all-around athleticism, I’d say his unwavering ambition is considered one of his most spectacular qualities.”
Whereas Suzuki was impressed by Trout’s expertise, he cautioned that his aim was much less to play identical to Trout and extra to channel his power into maximizing his expertise, which is what he noticed from Trout in these movies.
“Baseball is a sport you play day by day,” Suzuki mentioned. “By giving myself the problem of maximizing my potential to the fullest like Trout had accomplished along with his, I used to be capable of push myself once I acquired annoyed by telling myself, ‘I’ll wager he saved pushing himself,’ or once I would really feel exhausted, I’d assume, ‘You’re not going to succeed in your finest like he did in the event you cease right here.’ He wasn’t my rival; he was my inspiration.”
Along with his fielding exploits, which earned him 5 of Japan’s Golden Glove awards, Suzuki hit .300 or higher in six consecutive seasons for Hiroshima, profitable batting titles in 2019 and 2021. Those self same seasons, he additionally led the Central League in on-base share and on-base plus slugging share. He hit 25 or extra dwelling runs yearly as an everyday and reached double digits in stolen bases 3 times. He made two all-star groups and represented Japan on the 2017 World Baseball Basic and in final summer time’s Tokyo Olympics, the place he earned a gold medal.
Whereas Suzuki mentioned he initially had not thought-about competing in america, that problem ultimately turned the pure development of his dedication to maximise his potential. Suzuki acknowledged Trout’s affect by adopting his jersey quantity, 27, upon signing with the Cubs.
As Suzuki talked in regards to the exhilaration from all the brand new issues he hopes to come across in American baseball — like Burnes’s minimize fastball — he threw in an sudden curveball, which made Kuroda’s remark about his quest for self-improvement all of the extra obvious.
“I even think about the followers’ manner of heckling is completely different right here, and I can’t wait to expertise that,” he mentioned.
If his begin is any indication of how his profession will develop, being heckled might not occur typically, no less than not in Chicago.
Brad Lefton is a bilingual journalist primarily based in St. Louis who has coated baseball in Japan and America for practically three a long time.
