Made in Japan

Yu Darvish, the latest high profile starting pitcher from Japan, has already been having his name mentioned with the Cy Young award.  While I feel it is far too early to suggest awards for players, if there was any talk of awarding the Cy Young after one month, you would have a hard time arguing against the Texas Rangers starter.  After five starts, he holds a 4-0 record while ranking fifth in the American League in both strikeouts (33) and ERA (2.18).

Numbers can sometimes be deceiving, especially for a pitcher who batters have not got a look at before.  Nonetheless, I thought it would be worth comparing him to the first five starts of every other Japanese pitcher who has made at least 100 starts in the Major Leagues.  The one player excluded was former Montreal Expo Tomo Ohka who debuted primarily as a reliever.  By my count, that leaves less than a half dozen other players:

After 5 Starts:
Hideo Nomo (1995):  0-0, 26.2 IP, 3.71 ERA, 40 K, 18 BB, .202 BA, .694 OPS

Masato Yoshii (1998):  1-1, 30.0 IP, 2.70 ERA, 23 K, 10 BB, .239 BA, .710 OPS

Kazuhisa Ishii (2002):  5-0, 29.2 IP, 3.03 ERA, 34 K, 16 BB, .214 BA, .594 OPS

Daisuke Matsuzaka (2007):  3-2, 33.0 IP, 4.36 ERA, 38 K, 10 BB, .242 BA, .650 OPS

Hiroki Kuroda (2008):  1-2, 30.2 IP, 3.82 ERA, 16 K, 8 BB, .278 BA, .731 OPS

Yu Darvish (2012):  4-0, 33.0 IP, 2.18 ERA, 33 K, 17 BB, .238 BA, .660 OPS

One interesting piece is that Nomo, Yoshii, and Ishii each pitched five to seven shutout innings in their debut, and Matsuzaka and Kuroda allowed only one run over seven innings each.  By the third, fourth, and fifth starts, batters seemed to have a better idea of what to expect, and most of them had poor games for at least one of those starts.  Nomo had a poor start in his second start, giving up seven runs.

Darvish has been a bit of an anomaly in that sense.  He debuted against the Seattle Mariners in April, and promptly gave up four runs in the first inning, and one more in the second.  He settled down, and since that second inning, he has only given up three earned runs in the last 31 innings he pitched.  If one was to ignore those first two innings, his ERA would be a stunning 0.87.  It isn't as if he is skating by on lowly teams by any means either.  His troubling first game was against the Seattle Mariners, but his last (and best) three games have come against the New York Yankees, Toronto Blue Jays, and Detroit Tigers who currently rank 3rd, 4th, and 7th respectively in runs scored (Texas is in 1st).

Of the players mentioned above, it is worth noting how each continued on in their debut season.  Nomo would continue on to a stellar year that saw him win Rookie of the Year for the Los Angeles Dodgers and finish fourth in the Cy Young voting with a 13-6 record and 2.54 ERA.  He would pitched in the Majors through 2005 (plus a very brief stint in 2008).  While productive, he was never able to reproduce the numbers of his rookie season in 1995.

Yoshii's promising start finished solid enough with a 6-8 record and 3.93 ERA, but was far from special.  Like Nomo, it was the best he would do at the Major League level, and only pitched four more seasons, the best of them mediocre.

Ishii's fantastic 5-0 start would continue to 14-10 as he struggled with control.  He walked 106 batters in his rookie season (2002) to lead the National League, and 101 the next season to finish in second.  His career only last four seasons in the Major Leagues.

More recently, Matsuzaka would have a mediocre first season with the Red Sox, but had a stellar sophmore appearance, making a run at the Cy Young with an 18-3 record and 2.90 ERA.  Since then, he has been plagued by injury problems and made only 44 starts over the last three seasons.  This year he has yet to debut, being hampered by more injuries.

The aged (37) Kuroda has only been in the Major Leagues for four full seasons, but could be considered the most consistent Japanese import.  His ERA has always ranged between 3.07 and 3.76, including this year in his first year with the Yankees.  Perhaps Kuroda's best measure is his WHIP which has never measured over 1.22 in his four full seasons.

It will be very interesting to see how things play out for Darvish.  Initially, it looked like Darvish may struggle with walking batters like Ishii after he walked 13 batters in the first three games while striking out only 14.  However, in the last two games he has walked only 2 batters while striking out 19.  It is a small sample size, but it could be a sign of things to come.

Furthermore, the greater challenge for Darvish, who I remind you is only 25, will like be whether or not he can continue to build on this success.  Of the other pitchers mentioned, they generally all peaked their first or second season in the majors.  Even Nomo who is remembered for his early success, including the only no-hitter at Coors Field against a very stacked Rockies lineup hit his peak early.  After 1996, he spent the next five seasons pitching for five different teams with below average results.  In 2002 and 2003, he would return to the Dodgers and put together two more very solid years before breaking down in his final couple of years.

Only Kuroda has managed to continually improve season to season, but only so much.  He began solid enough, but his numbers have never screamed for the Cy Young.  Can Darvish steadily improve (or at least maintain a similar level to where he is at)?  Or could he prove to be another Matsuzaka or Nomo who showed stunning stuff early in a career, only to fall back to the middle of the pack in years to come?  The next chance we will get to find out should be Sunday when Yu and the Rangers take on the Cleveland Indians.  At the rate he is going, he could become the first Japanese import to reach the glorified 20-win season.