Ichiro Suzuki is all about baseball, but he’s much more than that in Japan. Back home, he’s a wellspring of national pride, much like Shohei Ohtani now. His triumphs across the Pacific buoyed the nation as Japan’s economy sputtered through the so-called lost decades of the 1990s and into the 2000s.
“He healed the wounds in Japan´s national psyche,” Kiyoteru Tsutsui, professor of sociology at Stanford University, told The Associated Press.
On Tuesday, he´s expected to be the first Japanese player elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame, and possibly only the second player chosen unanimously after New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera.
Ichiro debuted in Major League Baseball in 2001 with the Seattle Mariners, the first Japanese position player to span the Pacific and an instant star. Left-handed pitcher Hideo Nomo preceded him, and Hideki Matsui came just after, both boosting the country’s confidence in a period of national malaise.
Tsutsui termed Ichiro a “great cultural export,” akin to Hello Kitty, sushi, manga and others creations from Japan.
“It may not be an exaggeration to say that Ichiro represents Japan’s transition from the faceless economic animal to a producer of global cultural icons,” Tsutsui said.
Ichiro started playing baseball at age 7 on a Little League team near Nagoya in central Japan. Sure, baseball is baseball, but the culture around the game – known as “yakyu” (field ball) – is special.