The Meaning of Ichiro: The New Wave From Japan & the Transformation of Our National Pastime

April 7, 2004

Speaker
Robert Whiting, author

Presider
Tracy Dahlby, independent journalist & filmmaker

Robert Whiting, author of You Gotta Have Wa, The Chrysanthemum and the Bat and Tokyo Underworld: the Fast Times and Hard Life of an American Gangster in Japan, spoke about his new book, The Meaning of Ichiro: the New Wave from Japan & the Transformation of Our National Pastime.

Described by Tracy Dahlby as "One of the very best cultural observers ever to come down the bilateral pike," Mr. Whiting began writing about Japanese baseball almost a decade after graduating in politics from Tokyo's Sophia University in 1969. He said that his first book, Chrysanthemum, was rejected by 13 publishing houses in a row and ultimately picked up by an editor who, himself, expected the book to lose money. He had told Mr. Whiting, "Nobody knows they play baseball in Japan. Nobody even knows they have baseball in Japan."

But Time magazine chose it as the best sports book of 1977; and in 1989, Mr. Whiting published Wa, a bestselling study of how culture shapes the play of baseball in Japan and the U.S. In Ichiro, Mr. Whiting looks at how, in playing baseball together, Japanese and Americans are opening up and shaping their own baseball cultures. Mr. Whiting acknowledged the Yankees' Hideki Matsui as an agent of change, but the focus of his book is Ichiro Suzuki, a baseball idol not only to Japanese but Americans of all ages and backgrounds.

As soon as Ichiro joined the Seattle Mariners, his "electric style of play" showed Americans another way to play baseball," Mr. Whiting said. He credited Ichiro with increasing the crowd at Safeco Field by 10 percent and dramatically changing the composition of attendees. Seattleites are fishermen and loggers of Scandinavian descent: "Fifteen years ago these guys did not have the faintest idea what sushi was. Now they eat sushi at Safeco Field…and yell 'Gambatte' to Ichiro," he observed. Commenting that the Japanese in Seattle have borne the brunt of discrimination, Mr. Whiting said the image of a little white boy in a crowd of 45,000 carrying a sign saying "I want to be Ichiro when I grow up" signals a dramatic change in racial attitudes.

Mr. Whiting told of how, in Japan, early-morning satellite broadcasts of Mariners games edged out the popularity of the dominant Tokyo Giants. To explain how Japan felt about Ichiro, he quoted sportswriter Midori Masujima: "We've never been a member of the world community. We may have been a guest, a provisional member or a member-in-training, but never a full-fledged member." What Japan lacked was a sex symbol. What Ichiro won for Japan was more than athletic validation. He represented an energetic self-assured Japan at a time of grave cultural self-doubt, according to Ms. Masujima.

Mr. Whiting explained that Ichiro is a product of the Japanese baseball system and a baseball-obsessed father. Ideals of attaining perfection through endless, extreme forms of training through the martial arts (bushido) tradition and the willingness to sacrifice oneself for the team (seishin yakyu) are very Japanese. Ichiro spent practically all of his waking youthful hours in training, first with his father and later in special schools; Hideki Matsui's story is similar, noted Mr. Whiting.

According to Mr. Whiting, the single biggest difference between Japan and America or Europe is the emphasis on the group (wa) and not the individual. He believes the Major Leagues could learn a lot from Japanese discipline. In fact, he said the message is catching on.

You've written three books, which should I read first?

"I would read Wa first, then The Meaning of Ichiro, then Chrysanthemum. Wa was the result of 12 years of writing about Japanese baseball and watching the cultural clash between Japanese and Americans. "That's the book I'm proudest of… until The Meaning of Ichiro, of course," he wryly added.

What do you think of the also-rans involved in the U.S leagues who didn't become as famous or don't have the star quality--Hideki Irabu, Bobby Valentine or Masanori Murakami of the San Francisco Giants?

Mr. Whiting said he knew Hideki Irabu and I liked him a lot. "I think he needs a good psychiatrist," he observed. In his view, Mr. Irabu suffers from depression stemming from feelings of abandonment by his G.I. father: "That's why, when Steinbrenner called him a 'fat pussy toad,' it hurt him, because it brought back those childhood memories."

Mr. Whiting also shed light on the story of Mr. Murakami, who came into the Major Leagues in 1964 through an option clause in his contract with the minor league team, the San Francisco Hawks. Not two years later, Mr. Murakami's father discovered the baseball player was living in a motel room with a blonde stewardess-girlfriend, and ordered him home.

Ichiro has criticized the American workout (or lack thereof), but with players like Bobby Valentine going back to Japan to manage, you'll see more of an American management style there too. What other changes do you foresee?

Ichiro has opened the mindset in Japan to new ways; a lot of teams are cutting out the morning walk and evening workouts, whereas before this would have been construed as laziness, according to Mr. Whiting. But not all has changed: "They still work long hours during the day and can't bring their wives to camp, he declared."

When they announce the World Cup in two weeks, does Japan have a chance?

Japan has some of the best pitchers in the world; it has a very good chance, Mr. Whiting replied.

Why did the Pacific League move out of the Tokyo Dome?

Mr. Whiting said the Pacific League is trying to create an American-style franchise in Sapporo. The Japanese regime has one, not multiple, farm systems, and it plow profits back into the corporations who own the teams, instead of investing in player development.

Ichiro reminds me of a cartoon I grew up with. What do you make of yakyu manga?

Mr. Whiting immediately recognized the reference to a Japanese 1977-78 TV series, Kyojin no Hoshi, in which a young trainee "underwent brutal training with his body and went on to star with the Giants." Mr. Whiting said Ichiro's father wrote an autobiography, and in the autobiography he denied that Ichiro's life was like Hoshi's--it was fun, he said. Mr. Whiting said he asked Ichiro about this, and Ichiro replied, laughingly, "He's a liar." It was the only time he answered in English, said Mr. Whiting, who reported that Ichiro joked that his treatment bordered on child abuse, and that his life was exactly like Hoshi's.

What do the ballplayers who come to the U.S. from Japan have in common?

"Going to the States has become a test of manhood," replied Mr. Whiting. He illustrated his point with an anecdote about the dilemma of Hideki Matsui, when he had to choose between being the first Japanese player to leave the Giants for the Major Leagues and feel like a traitor; or stay on and be seen as a wimp. According to Mr. Whiting, the teary-eyed Matsui announced at his press conference, "I hope people don't think I'm a traitor but I have to go to America."

--Ann Rutledge