  A look back at 1997: Because
Yakult led the Central League from wire to wire despite
extremely low expectations, it's tempting to say that
everything that could have gone right for the Swallows
did in 1997. But that's not quite accurate.
Takehiko
Kobayakawa did get the team off to a winning start by
belting three opening day homers off of Giants ace Masaki
Saito. But even Kobayakawa slumped through most of the
season, batting .249 and hitting one fourth of his home
runs in that first game. By the middle of the season, the
Carp cast-off was sharing first base duties with Jim
Tatum.
Injuries kept the
Swallows line-up in constant change. Productive center
fielder Tetsuya Iida missed almost thirty games because
of injuries and second baseman Hatsuhiko Tsuji missed
even more. One of the Swallows greatest assets proved to
be a deep well of reserve players who could fill in for
injured starters.
Even when
Katsuyuki Dobashi, filling in for injured Tsuji at
second, went on the DL, former Orix infielder Toshifumi
Baba took over without missing a beat. Mitsuru Manaka
easily filled the void in center field left by Iida in
the middle of the season and during the Japan Series.
The Swallows
pitching staff was just as problematic. Only Masato
Yoshii stayed effective the entire season. Kazuya Tabata,
though earning marks similar to Yoshii's, had trouble in
August when a strain of measles kept several players  including himself out of action.
Though starting strong, Terry Bross lost his
effectiveness, and by the middle of the season found
himself on the team's minor league squad.
Both Tomohito Ito
and Kazuhisa Ishii came back from off-season surgery, the
latter missing the first two months of the season. Three
starters who had been excellent in past years, Kenjiro
Kawasaki, Yoichii Okabayashi and Futoshi Yamabe all
posted disappointing records by season's end.
The key to
Yakult's success was the team's ability to overcome all
of the problems that came their way and play consistently
through the entire season.
Going into the
Japan Series, some critics claimed the capstone series
would be a battle between Seibu's pitching versus
Yakult's clutch-hitting. Such was the conventional, and
erroneous, wisdom
In fact, the
Swallows led the Central League in both pitching (3.26
ERA) and batting (.276). Clutch-hitting may have played
its part, but the Swallows batted regularly all season,
and despite pitchers falling in and out of the starting
rotation, the team pitched well from opening day.
Consistency got the Swallows to the Japan Series, not
flashy play. It was the experience of plugging holes in
the line-up and pitching staff that made them stronger.
A more accurate,
though less sexy, preview of the Japan Series would have
framed the competition as Yakult's tempered experience
versus Seibu's youthful enthusiasm.
Pitching:
Yakult may not
have the flashiest mound crew in Japan, but in 1997 they
out-performed every other team's pitching staff. The
Swallows posted a Japan-best 3.26 team ERA (runner up
Orix had 3.61). The rest of Yakult's team numbers were
somewhat less impressive. In the Central League, only two
teams surrendered more home runs and hits than the
Swallows (134 and 1124). While only Yomiuri issued fewer
walks than Yakult (442), the Swallows ranked fourth with
870 strikeouts.
Both Kazuya
Tabata (2.96 ERA, 15-5, 83 strikeouts) and Masato Yoshii
(2.99, 13-6, 104) pitched effectively wire to wire,
lending a great deal of consistency to the staff while
other pitchers went in and out of the starting rotation.
Terry Bross pitched reasonably well at the beginning of
the season, but by June he was starting to give up a lot
of runs, finishing the season 7-8 with a 4.99 ERA and 89
strikeouts. Though Kenjiro Kawasaki pitched a complete
game shutout In June, he remained one of the team's most
erratic starters (4.19, 7-5, 48). Two pitchers who had
been very effective in the past until arm troubles set
in, Yoichi Okabayashi and Futoshi Yamabe both pitched
miserably in 1997.
Another pitcher
who had arm troubles and off-season surgery, Kazuhisa
Ishii returned to the Swallows in June after a six month
rehabilitation and pitched better than he ever had
before. Compiling a 1.91 ERA in 117.5 innings, the lefty
whom Yokohama's Bobby Rose compared to Randy Johnson
earned a 10-4 record with 120 strikeouts. Japan's
most effective starting pitcher in 1997, Ishii struck out
more batters per nine-innings than anyone else while also
allowing the fewest hits, home runs and base runners per
game.
On September 2,
Ishii no-hit the second place BayStars. Six weeks later,
he pitched a nine-inning shut-out gem to win game one of
the Japan Series, allowing only three hits and three
walks while striking out twelve (to tie the existing
record for strikeouts in a Japan Series game).
With all the
pitchers going in and out of the Swallows' starting
rotation, the Yakult bullpen did a great job holding
things together. Middle reliever Hiroto Katoh earned a
5-1 record with six saves and a 1.99 ERA. Joining him
were Tetsuhiro Nonaka (2.28 ERA, 2-3) Hiroaki Hirota
(2.71 ERA, 1-0, three saves), two players who had never
been given much of a chance with their former teams
before joining the Swallows in 1997.
Tomohito Ito and
Shingo Takatsu, Yakult's top two closers, together earned
40 save points. Ito, the 1993 Rookie of the Year who
missed the following two season with arm trouble and
earned a 5.40 ERA in 1996, came back in 1997 with a 1.51
ERA and a 7-2 record with nineteen saves in 34 games.
Nicknamed Mr. Zero because he has never allowed
an earned run in any Japan Series appearance, Takatsu
compiled a 7-4 record with seven saves and a 2.04 regular
season ERA. After Ito blew a save attempt on September 23
against the Carp, Manager Nomura used him sparingly for
the rest of the season, giving most of the Japan Series
closing duties to Takatsu.
With Masato
Yoshii and Terry Bross leaving, the Swallows may enter
the 1998 season with a big gap in their starting
rotation.
Offense:
Things didn't
look too good for Yakult coming into the 1997 season.
After their fourth place 1996 finish, the team released
third baseman Hensley Muelens (who hit 25 home runs that
year) and 1995 MVP Tom O'Malley. To fill the offensive
gap, the Swallows signed minor leaguers Luis Ortiz and
Dwayne Hosey, while Takehiko Kobayakawa, the 1985 Rookie
of the Year who hadn't done much since his breakthrough
season, was inked to take over first base. Sluggers
Atsuya Furuta and Takehiro Ikeyama both came off of a bad
1996 season, and most critics expected them to sink
further in 1997.
On opening day,
however, Kobayakawa got the Swallows off to a winning
start by clubbing three home runs against Yomiuri ace
Masaki Saito. From that first game, the Swallows never
let go of first place. By the all-star break, Yakult had
compiled a team .278 batting average. Widely criticized
before the season began, Hosey had been silencing critics
with his home runs, belting three on July 9 and slugging
eleven in August to take the league lead.
Though Hosey
slumped in September, Yakult finished the season with a
CL-best .276 team batting average and 138 home runs
(third). The Swallows also led the circuit in hits
(1309), doubles (230), triples (138), total bases
(2,013), stolen bases (123) and runs scored (672). With a
consistent mixture of batting, speed and home runs,
Yakult scored one-hundred runs more than second place
Yokohama.
Still, things did
not go completely smoothly for the Swallows' offense.
Although Kobayakawa hit six home runs in April, he would
only club six more during the rest of the season. Both
his and third baseman Takehiro Ikeyama's batting average
remained near .200 as summer arrived. Aging second base
man Hatsuhiko Tsuji, who batted .333 in 1996, became
injured and missed several games while replacement
Katsuyki Dobashi, hitting well over .300, also sat on the
sidelines for a few weeks. After hitting poorly Luis
Ortiz was released in June, around the same time that
all-star center fielder Tetsuya Iida went on the disabled
list.
To bolster their
injured line-up, in June the Swallows acquired Toshifumi
Baba from Orix and Jim Tatum from the San Diego Padres
organization. Baba had been a reserve infielder and
winner of Japan's golden glove a few years back while
Tatum had been a jack-of-all positions in the minor
leagues. Both players bolstered the Yakult infield while
offering unexpected offense. Baba, never much of a power
hitter, clubbed his first home run of the season on July
5 and two days later belted two balls over the fence.
Playing primarily at first base, Tatum finished the
season with a .309 average and thirteen home runs in 51
games while slugging .640.
Unlike the other
Yakult replacement players, Mitsuru Manaka had been with
the Swallows for years. A twenty-six year old left-handed
outfielder who had never been given much of a chance to
prove himself in his first four years, Manaka filled in
for injured center fielder Tetsuya Iida. Swinging a
red-hot bat, Manaka batted over .400 in the early part of
the season before finishing with a .338 average in 87
games and 228 at-bats. After Iida injured his shoulder
sliding into third base during the Swallows last home
game of the season, Manaka returned as the Yakult center
fielder in the Japan Series, batting .333 with eight RBIs
against the Lions.
Since Hosey took
over left field when he joined the team in 1997,
Katsuyuki Dobashi, the position's previous occupant, was
relegated to part-time status. Fortunately for him,
Hatsuhiko Tsuji's injuries opened up second base. A
versatile player, Dobashi made the best of the opening,
batting .301 with 61 RBIs and 22 doubles. In the 1997
Japan Series, the right-handed utility man played every
inning at second base, compiling a .428 batting average
with twelve RBIs.
Of the six Yakult
players who qualified for the Central League batting
title, accumulating more than 218 plate appearances,
right fielder Atsunori Inaba posted the lowest batting
average (.267, down from .301 a year earlier) while
clubbing 21 home runs (up from eleven). Despite getting
off to a slow start, third base man Takahiro Ikeyama
belted eighteen home runs with a .276 average while
shortstop Shinya Miyamoto hit .282 in 115 games. Though
Manaka took his lead-off position in the line-up for a
good chunk of the season, Tetsuya Iida earned a .301
average with 26 stolen bases.
By the middle of
September, with the Swallows positioned to take the CL
pennant, the press began to speculate who should be
awarded the league MVP. Only two names seemed likely:
Dwayne Hosey and Atsuya Furuta. Until the end of August,
the month in which Hosey belted eleven home runs, the
imported outfielder appeared to be the front-runner. His
average falling from a high of nearly .330 in early July,
Hosey slumped in September and finished the season with a
.289 average and a 38-jewel home run crown.
Though
demonstrating less power than his teammate, catcher
Atsuya Furuta finished the season batting .322 with 32
doubles, nine home runs, 86 RBIs and a .413 on-base
percentage. While guiding the Swallows pitching staff to
a league-low 3.26 team ERA, the thirty-two year old
backstop surged in September, helping the Swallows win
several games with his clutch-hitting.
After earning the
Japan Series MVP with a series .315 average and eleven
RBIs as well as a home run that won game three and a
double that gave Yakult the lead in game four, Furuta was
named Central League MVP while also earning the Shoriki
Award for outstanding contribution to Japanese baseball.
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