On Wednesday the Yakult Swallows accepted LA's $11,264,055 bid for the rights to negotiate with their pitcher Kazuhisa Ishii. Ishii and the Swallows went through the same posting system that Ichiro went through last year. The $11+ million dollars (the AP reported that Dan Evans determined the exact figure by adding a combination of his kids' birthdays and ages) only guarantees the Dodgers the right to negotiate with Ishii; it does not mean that he will sign with them, although it is highly unlikely that LA would put up this much cash and then not sign him. They are currently expected to work out a deal that would pay the pitcher three to four million dollars a year for three years.

The Dodgers were involved in the Ichiro bidding last year, but obviously lost out to the Mariners. Seattle, Anaheim, Texas, and the New York Mets reportedly submitted losing bids for Ishii. The 28-year-old Ishii is a left-handed pitcher who is thought to have four major league quality pitches. A member of LA's front office compared him to Andy Pettitte, and Shawn Green, who had the opportunity to observe Ishii firsthand during a MLB tour of the Japanese Leagues, has reportedly compared him to Eric Milton. Looking at his stats, it does not appear that he has the dominance of Pettitte, and while from a control pitching perspective Milton might be a more accurate likeness, I'm still not fond of comparison. I'd like to see some data on his walks and hits before I go out on a limb by picking a similar pitcher, but right now I see him as no better than a three starter, giving the Dodgers a very balanced rotation with Brown, Nomo, Daal, and Ashby.

While I don't expect Ishii to have the kind of impact that Ichiro had last year, the fact that they went through the same process in order to join the majors makes this a good opportunity for me to discuss the relationship between the Japanese Leagues and Major League Baseball. Many writers and commentators have been very public with their opinions that MLB has done a great injustice to baseball in Japan over the last few years. They feel that MLB is robbing Japan of talent, then dishonoring that talent by allowing their veteran players to win the Rookie of the Year award over here, and diluting their teams with our own mediocre players. This is an opinion with which I strongly disagree. First of all, Major League Baseball does represent the highest level of baseball competition. The league hosts the best of the best, and that's why they have the World Series even though only two countries actually host teams. Major League Baseball is as big a melting pot as the United States, and players gravitate here to show off their skills in the most prominent arena for their talents. I object to the idea that MLB steals talent, as the players turn down larger sums of money in Japan for the prestige of the majors. In short, they would rather be medium-sized fish in the ocean of life than sharks in their local ponds.

Other leagues and countries may have many talented players, but their quality of play as a whole does not measure up to that assembled in the Major Leagues. Ron Shandler's Baseball Forecaster compares the Japanese Pacific and Central League to "very good Triple-A level ball", and comments that "the pitching may be even better." It also does an excellent job of highlighting the stylistic differences between Japanese baseball and MLB, noting that the cultural differences are evident in the way the game is played.

"Japanese baseball's guiding philosophy centers on risk avoidance. Mistakes are not tolerated. Since fewer risks are taken, runners rarely take extra bases, batters focus on making contact rather than driving the ball, and managers play for one run at a time, rather than going for a big inning."

He also notes that they have smaller fields, more artificial turf, and that the teams have smaller pitching staffs. Given these differences and the overall level of play, I do not think that it is insulting to vote for a Japanese veteran as MLB Rookie of the Year.

Jackie Robinson, the first Rookie of the Year, was a veteran of the Negro Leagues. In that case, players of the same and sometimes even a higher quality than those in Major League Baseball were discriminated against, and I can't recall an instance of anyone saying Robinson should not have received the award because he wasn't a true rookie.

The fact that the best of Japan's players can mix with the best players from other countries all over the world is a large part of the greatness of Major League Baseball, and once a player enters the majors it is, as they say, a whole new ballgame. The players are eligible for the Rookie of the Year, because this is the first time they are playing in at the major league level.

As for the concern over diluting Japanese leagues with MLB outcasts, while Major League Baseball allows anyone with the ability to make it to the majors to play in the league, the Japanese have actually instituted rules that limit the number of "foreign" players who can be on a team. They have a solid handle on the situation and have thus far manipulated the system to their advantage in many cases with teams reaping large rewards for players' negotiated rights, as with Ichiro and Ishii. I'm just waiting for the first time a team shells out after a player has posted and then that player decides not to sign. I don't think it will happen immediately, but sooner or later someone's going to play the system and then it's going to need revision.

I shared my displeasure when Ichiro was announced as MVP, as I feel that despite the fact that he obviously had a fantastic season, he was not the Most Valuable Player last year and that his election was in large part due to overcompensation by the voters for a perceived slight of Japanese Baseball. Japan obviously has a wealth of talent, but that does not obscure the fact that Major League Baseball is still something special, unique, and worthy of being placed on a pedestal, at least in terms of the quality of its players. I will spend an article in the near future discussing the sordid mess in which the game's management has embroiled itself.