The Dodgers Asian Connection

I started to think about this after Yoshida was signed by the Red Sox. The Dodgers were one of the first teams to dive into the Asian market. The Giants were the first team to ever have an Asian player when they signed Masanori Murakami back in 1964. He saw some success as a reliever. His last season with SF was 1965, It would be 30 years before another would come to the US.

The first Japanese player to play in the Major leagues since Murakami, signed with the Dodgers in 1995. Hideo Nomo came to the Dodgers as a free agent that year. Nomo was 26 at the time. He had come off of an 8-7 season in 94 with the Kintetsu Buffalos. He would go 13-6 with a 2.54 ERA and 236 K’s and he was named the NL Rookie of the Year. He would strike out an average of 235 hitters his first three seasons in the NL. After three very good seasons with the Dodgers, he started the 98 season 2-7 and was traded to the New York Mets with Brad Clontz for Greg McMichael and Dave Miliki. He would return to the Dodgers as a free agent in 2002. He would have two more good seasons, 02-03 and then in 04 he went 4-11 and was not resigned. He played in 19 games for the Rays in 05 and three with the Royals in 06. He was not re-signed by any MLB team after that. He finished with a 123-109 record. 81-66 with the Dodgers.

Chan Ho Park was the first Korean born player signed by the Dodgers. He was signed in 1994 and actually beat Nomo to the Dodgers appearing in 2 games in 1994. He did not stick in the league until 1996. Then he was a member of the rotation. From 97 to 2001 he won at least 13 or more games. 18 in 2000 was his high-water mark. He made the NL All-Star team in 2001. I remember him most for giving up two grand slam homers to Fernando Tatis of the Cardinals in the same inning. He also famously tried to karate kick another player on a play at first. He left the team as a free agent after the 2001 season. He won in double figures, 12, only once after he left the Dodgers 2005. He returned to LA and went 4-4 in 2008 and was released. He finished his MLB career in 2010 with the Pirates. He finished with a 124-98 career mark. He was 84-58 as a Dodger. Neither he nor Nomo ever won a postseason game for the Dodgers.

The Dodgers made history again when they signed a Chinese kid from Taiwan, Chin-Feng Chen in January of 1999. Chen went to San Bernadino of the Cal League for the 1999 season. His first season was impressive as he slashed .316/.404/.580 with a OPS of .984, 31 homers and 123 RBI’s. The next season at AA San Antonio he did not come close to those numbers hitting .277 with only 6 long balls. He played at AA and A ball with Jacksonville, AA and Vero Beach, A ball and rebounded to a combined .290 with 22 homers. 17 of them at the AA level. In 2002 he was promoted to AAA Las Vegas. He slashed .284/.352/503 with a OPS of .855. He had 26 homers, and 84 RBI’s. He got a September call-up getting into 3 games and he was 0-5. He went back to Vegas for the 03 season. He hit 26 homers again with 86 RBI’s this time. He had another cup of coffee with the Dodgers getting into only one game. This would repeat itself in 04-05. Finally in 05 he would get his first MLB hits. He ended up appearing in 7 games going 2-8. Those would end up being his last MLB at bats. That is literally a cup of coffee.

Leary of going back to AAA he was granted his free agency and decided he would not return to American baseball for the 06 season. He ended up playing in the CPBL, Chinese Professional Baseball Legue in Taiwan. He played there for 11 seasons and was a career .3-4 hitter in that league. He also swatted 132 homers in the CPBL. Over all the leagues he played in, his total was 278 long balls. I think he never really got a chance to stick in LA. He appeared in 2001 World Baseball Cup, 2003 Asian Baseball Championship, 2004 Olympics, 2006 Asian Games, 2007 Asian Baseball Championship, 2008 Olympic Qualifying Final Qualifying Tournament, and 2016 Exhibition games against Japan. When he retired following the 2016 season, his team, the Lamigo Monkey’s, retired his #52 jersey. He also hit the first grand slam in Konami Cup history in the 2006 series.

Ryu was purchased from the Hanwha Eagles by the Dodgers December 12th, 2012. He was immediately inserted into the starting rotation for the 2013 campaign. He had a very good start to his career with a 14-8 3.00 campaign in 30 starts. He also had two complete games. He was not what one would call a power pitcher. He struck out 154 batters in 192 innings. He pitched in two games in the postseason that year, getting a no decision against the Braves in the NLDS and winning his only start in the NLCS against the Cardinals. 2014 was more of the same, 14-7, 3.38. He made 26 starts and only pitched 152 innings. He got a no decision in his only start in the postseason. Then the problems began.

Ryu had some shoulder issues that had cost him a few games in 14. He went into spring training in 2015 with much optimism that he could pitch 200 innings. But he started having back issues. He was shut down for a couple of weeks. When he returned to throwing, the Dodgers noticed a serious drop in velocity. Eventually he would have surgery on the labrum in his left shoulder and would miss the entire 2015 season. He came back on July 7th in 2016, got hammered in his only game of the year, reported elbow stiffness, and was shut down for the rest of the season. Another lost year.

In 2017 he was able to pitch in 25 games. He had a 5-9 record with a 3.77 ERA. He obviously was not all the way back, but there was a lot of hope for 2018. Once again the injury bug hit, this time a groin knocked him out of action. But he finished 7-3 1.97 in 15 games. He pitched in three games in the postseason, shutting out the Braves in his start against them. Then he lost a game to the Brewers in the NLDS. He became the first Korean to start a game in the World Series when he faced Boston in game 2. He went 4.2 innings and got the loss. A free agent after the season, he took a one year 17.9 million dollar deal to return to the Dodgers for 2019.

He won in double figures for the first time since 2014, 14-5, 2.32 ERA, which led the league. He was an All-Star for the first time and was 2nd in the Cy Young voting. He won his only postseason start, beating the Nationals 10-2 in Game 3. Ryu loved to hit. That season he hit his first and so far, only HR off of Anthony Senzatela of the Rockies. He was known for hitting homers in BP and the announcers kept saying it was only a matter of time. His rookie season, he got 3 hits in a game and became the first Dodger pitcher since Randy Wolf in 2009 to accomplish that. Over his career, his batting is not that impressive, but fans loved to watch him hit.

Chin Lung Hu is a Taiwanese born player signed by the Dodgers in 2003 as an amateur free agent. He played parts of 4 seasons with the Dodgers. He never really made any kind of impact, but he is on here simply because he allowed Charlie Steiner to have a moment of fun on the air. When Hu walked in a spring game, Steiner remarked, ” Finally, after 40 years I can finally say, Hu’s on first.” Probably my favorite line Steiner has ever uttered.

Amazingly to me, although they have had several Asian born pitchers who were good to very good, the Dodgers have never had an Asian position player of note. They have missed out signing any of the Asian star position players. In fact, I can think of only one Asian position player who was even a starter in the everyday lineup, and he came in a really bad trade in my mind. Hee-seop-Choi. He was part of the LoDuca trade with the Marlins. LA did get Brad Penny out of the deal, but Choi was awful in the 31 games he played that year. He went .253/15/42 in 05. It was his only full season in LA, and his last in the majors. He was claimed off waivers by the Red Sox in 06, but never played a game for them.

Some of the other Asian players who have played and made some impact for the Dodgers are Kenta Maeda, Takashi Saito, Yu Darvish, Hung Chi-Kuo, Hiroki Kuroda, Kazuhisa Ishii. One signing the Dodgers were counting on that did not pan out was Norihiro Nakamura. Nakamura was going to be Adrian Beltre’s replacement. He hit 404 homers over his career in Japan. But he flopped badly in his attempt to make it to the majors. He went back to Japan after being granted his release.

The last Asian position player to spend any time with the Dodgers was Yoshi Tsutsugo. He did not fare well with the Dodgers and was claimed off waivers by the Pirates, where he had a resurgence and earned himself a 2022 contract. At this point in time, he remains a free agent. Currently there are six Japanese born players in the majors, one of them most Dodger fans covet, Ohtani. The only active Taiwanese player is Yu Chang of the Red Sox. There are also six Koreans currently on MLB rosters. The Dodgers for on of the few times in the last couple decades have no Asian players on the 40 man. They do have a Korean pitched listed on the Great Lakes roster, Hyun Il Choi.

Will they dive in and try to sign Ohtani when he becomes a free agent after the season? Only time will tell. In any event, expect the Dodgers to do what they always do, explore every continent for legitimate talent.