Tag: robert
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After quake and tsunami, public split on baseball’s return to Japan
by Robert Whiting (Apr 11, 2011) – Sports Illustrated Besuboru is finally back in Japan, after a delay caused by the worst earthquake in the nation’s history and an ensuing tsunami that ravaged Northeastern Honshu. The Nippon Professional Baseball League (NPB) launches its season on April 12, 15 days later than scheduled, and Nippon leaders…
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The Fans in Japan: Why they’re happy when baseball players go on strike
by Robert Whiting (Sep 29, 2004) – Slate They said it would never happen: A baseball strike in harmony-conscious Japan? Yet two weeks ago, after lobbying unsuccessfully to block the proposed merger of two of the country’s 12 professional baseball teams, the Nippon Professional Baseball Players Association walked out for the first time in 70…
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Pitching From Behind: The sad road of Japanese pitcher Hideki Irabu
by Robert Whiting (Aug 1, 2011) – Slate Last week, former New York Yankees pitcher Hideki Irabu was found dead in his Southern California home, having apparently hanged himself. The 42-year-old Irabu, a baseball sensation in his home country of Japan, had a short, tumultuous career in the United States. In his 2004 book The Meaning of…
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DiMuro Debacle was Predictable, Author Says
Jack Gallagher (Jul 10, 1997) For acclaimed baseball author Robert Whiting, a periodic resident of Japan over the past 34 years, last month’s incident triggering the departure of U.S. umpire Mike DiMuro was no surprise. Whiting, who penned such classics as “The Chrysanthemum and The Bat” and “You Gotta Have Wa,” saw the inevitable clash of…
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Tobaku
Robert Whiting (Oct 21, 2015) I have been reading with interest about the gambling scandal in professional baseball. Kyojinfarm team pitcher Fukuda has admitted he bet on baseball and has lost a considerable amount of money at it in the process. A couple of weeks later, two other players on the ni-gun(the farm team) followed suit. An…
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The Umpire Strikes Out
Robert Whiting (Jun 23, 1997) In these days of “borderless” nations, few Americans blink at the idea of a Japanese baseball player like Hideki Irabu crossing the Pacific to pitch for the New York Yankees. But another transoceanic story is a reminder that globalization of the baseball diamond hasn’t ended national antics in the game.…
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Equaling Oh’s HR record proved difficult (part 3 of 3)
Robert Whiting (Oct 31, 2008) The one big black mark on Sadaharu Oh’s reputation was, of course, the unsportsmanlike behavior of the pitchers on his team whenever foreign batsmen threatened his single season home run record of 55. The phenomenon had first surfaced in 1985, when American Randy Bass playing for the Hanshin Tigers, who…
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Oh’s career sparkled with achievements as player, manager (part 2 of 3)
Robert Whiting (Oct 30, 2008) I watched Sadaharu Oh through much of his career with the Yomiuri Giants, living as I did in Tokyo, first as a student, then as an employee in a Japanese company and after that as a journalist. During that time it was impossible to miss what was going on with…
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Whiting pays tribute to Boyer, Halberstam
Robert Whiting (Jan 20, 2008) This is a tribute, long overdue, to Clete Boyer and David Halberstam, two class individuals who died last year. The former was an All-Star baseball player, one of the greatest fielding third basemen of all time. The latter was a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, who was perhaps the greatest reporter of…
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Baseball writing award for FCCJ’s Robert Whiting
July 2023 The Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) is an organization dedicated to the study and research of baseball. It was founded in 1971 and has grown to become one of the most prominent and respected organizations in the world of sport. It comprises fans, scholars, writers, statisticians and former players who share a…
Tokyo Junkie 