Diamond Days

Four foreign pro baseball players reflect on life in the game in Japan and back in the majors.

Yomiuri Giants pitcher Miles Mikolas stood on the mound, his gold chain glittering under the lights of Koshien Stadium, near Kobe. Hanshin fans banged their plastic thunder sticks as the opposing batter’s theme song filled the Friday night sky.

Giants setup man Scott Mathieson warmed up in the bullpen. With a runner on second and two outs in the eighth inning, the pressure was on. If the batter got on base, Mikolas knew he’d have to give way to Mathieson.

“My mindset is to just try to make sure that guy on second doesn’t score,” says Florida native Mikolas, 28, sitting in Traders’ Bar with Mathieson and Giants closer Arquimedes Caminero, after returning from a six-day road trip. “Just make a good pitch. If it doesn’t work out, I know they’ve got my back.”

The batter grounded out to short, and Mikolas, who played with the San Diego Padres and Texas Rangers before moving to Tokyo in 2015, secured his seventh win of the season. Caminero, one of Nippon Professional Baseball’s (NPB) top closers in his first season in the league, pitched a near perfect ninth inning for the save.

“I just try to get ready for any situation,” says Caminero, 30, who was Major League Baseball’s (MLB) second-hardest thrower during his time with three organizations.

Foreign baseball players have plied their trade in Japan since 1934. Some, such as Tuffy Rhodes and Randy Bass, hold league records. Most don’t last more than one season. Mathieson, 33, who spent nine years in the Philadelphia Phillies organization, is in his sixth season with the Giants.

Yomiuri corner infielder Casey McGehee, 34, returned to Japan this year after winning the NPB championship with Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles in 2012. He was only the second foreign position player to return to the majors from Japan, earning National League comeback player of the year with the Miami Marlins in 2013.

Teams are permitted four foreign players on their active rosters. The four non-Japanese teammates on the Giants squad—all Club Members—sat down with INTOUCH to talk about playing pro ball in Japan:

Mikolas: Whether or not [we] like to admit it, we are all here for a reason. We didn’t do as well as we wanted to do at the major league level, and we’ve come here to work on our game…and hopefully we earn a chance to go back and make it in the MLB.

Mathieson: I had three major surgeries, five in total. I was labeled back home as an injury-prone guy. I was doing well in the minor leagues, but I never got that shot. I was being passed over by younger players. For me, it was a chance to make a little money and have a fresh start.

Caminero: It was like an adventure. I always wanted to go to different places and explore the world. Japan was the best thing to do, especially when I can play baseball in a different country and still get more money than I was getting in the States.

McGehee: The first experience I had was such a good one. I enjoyed Japan, everything about it: the food, the culture, the people. I always had it in the back of my mind, somewhere towards the end of the road, I’d like to get back.

Caminero: There are different adjustments here: a lot of throwing. I’m not used to throwing so much.

Mathieson: I follow the Japanese program now, so I get up and throw a bullpen in the sixth inning. I pitch two to three times in the bullpen before I even get in the game. In the US, they wouldn’t let you do that. They would put a stop to it.

McGehee: Here, more is better sometimes. It forces you to mentally challenge yourself to be able to do it fundamentally sound, not just go through the motions.

Mathieson: There are skills that are a lot more polished over here that are lacking in the States because of that.

Mikolas: It’s more of a contact game over here. That pitch on the corner, it gets fouled off. With two strikes, their hitters are looking to be very defensive, and most of them are not looking to do much damage. You’ve got guys in the States, and their swing doesn’t change the entire at bat. They are trying to drive the ball into the outfield.

Mathieson: You get a lot of those little slap hits. That’s the most frustrating thing for pitchers.

Mikolas: You have to throw it way outside, almost in the other batter’s box sometimes, and guys will swing at it because they get in such a defensive mode.

Caminero: The good side of that is sometimes you throw it in the other batter’s box and the umpire will call it [a strike].

McGehee: About a month ago, I was trying to ask the umpire a question very politely, but because of the language barrier it got made into a bigger deal than it really was. He called a pitch a strike, and I was asking, “Is that the limit of the strike zone?” But he just heard me say, “Ball,” so he thought I was questioning the call.

Mikolas: There’s a little different etiquette here and there. Last year, there was a bunt and it rolled foul, and I kicked it towards our dugout. Sometimes in the States, if it’s rolling foul, you will see pitchers, instead of reaching down, they will just kind of kick it. Well, I had a meeting after the game. You don’t kick the ball here.

McGehee: One of the things I learned early on was the saying “shoganai”—what can you do? Some things happen that you can’t control. Just keep showing up to work in good spirits and working hard. Don’t take yourself too seriously and just buy into what is going on around you.

Mathieson: I have had multiple offers to go back home. I have always passed them over for comfort and financial stability as well, but mostly comfort. I love Japan and my family does. Travel is easy here. At home, you’re flying chartered flights and you get the luxury of that, but I like the convenience of being home and close to the family. I get to talk with my kids before bed or before a game.

Mikolas: Obviously, the major leagues is the major leagues, and that’s the top tier. They compare this league to just under that. There is always the fear that if you come here and are still unsuccessful, you will fall right off the map.

Mathieson: I like where I am, kind of off the radar. If I have a good game or a bad game on TV, I don’t have 30 phone calls after the game hearing about it—or having Pepsi cans thrown at me!

Mikolas: If someone said, “What’s the best thing about Japanese baseball?” I would say it’s their fans. If you are playing in the States anywhere but Wrigley or Yankee Stadium or Fenway on a Wednesday night, it feels like you are pitching in a graveyard. Here, it’s like a college football game every day.

Mathieson: Then when you do struggle, or not do well, they still support you. I was walking to the hotel from the bus yesterday [after a loss], and everyone was still clapping for me.

Mikolas: Win or lose, the fans are behind you. That sense of tradition you get that these people are diehard fans, and you are out there to represent the team and represent Tokyo for all the fans that are buying all the jerseys, coming to the games, waiting outside for autographs, supporting us as players. Our job is to give that back to them with our best effort on the field.

McGehee: I tell guys that the culture is different or the philosophy is different, and you aren’t going to change them. It’s up to you to be the one to adapt. If you can do that, players, coaches, even the fans, they will help you with that as you go along.

Mathieson: I didn’t know what to expect coming here because [the Giants] are always compared to the Yankees, and it’s one of the teams that I really despised growing up. But we won the league my first three years here, and I really ended up loving the Giants because they expect the best. They expect you to win.

Caminero: They try to make you a winning team, a winning person.

Words: Nick Narigon
Image: Benjamin Parks

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August 4 | 6–8pm