Good Deal.

Hideki Okajima has been signed to a 1 year $2.75 million deal; thus avoiding arbitration. Oki had a down year last year but bringing him back seemed obvious. Good for him.

The Jimmy Fund Goes International.

Sort of. Yesterday, Hideki Okajima visited the pediatric unit of St. Luke's International Hospital in Tokyo with the goal of spreading a smile. He had previously arranged a screening of the baseball-themed anime flick Major: Yūjō no Winning Shot for the hospital patients and their families. Here's the thing: This is a first-run movie, it was released last month. It's hard to imagine an American movie distributor allowing a baseball player to hold a private showing of a brand new film even if it was for cancer kids. Oki played catch, signed baseballs, and offered encouragement to the kiddos. Said Oki:

"I'm going to try my best again this year, so I want you all to try hard as well."

Say it with me: Awww.

And They're Off.

10:00am EST (5:00am local time): The weather in Honolulu is not ideal. It's raining and windy, the humidity (starting off at near 100%) will be brutal. The huge crowd of people (22,000) will make it seem warmer and smell very oddly.

10:01:52am EST (almost 5:02am local time): Oki (running with bib 37) makes it to the start line.

11:21:43am EST (6:22am local): 6.2 miles down, 20 more to go. Oki's pace is slow, he's coming in at around thirteen minute miles. At this rate he's looking at a finish somewhere around five and three quarters of a hour. The course is slow, though-the elite male runners took over half an hour to get to this point.


12:48:35pm EST (7:49am local time): Half way there. He picked up a little bit of speed, turning in 12+ minute miles. His finish time is probably closer to five and a half hours now.


2:16:41pm EST (9:17am local time): Now it gets tough. 18.6 miles in and Oki's time has taken a hit. He's slowed to nearly fourteen minute miles, likely because he's either stopped for a breather or walked a piece of it-either way once you walk it's hard to get going again. It may well have become a battle of wills already: Oki's body telling him to shut it down v. his ability to push on. And he's got seven and a half more miles to gut his way through.


3:50:03pm EST (10:50am local time): 24.8 miles down. I've never been to Honolulu but if he can't see the finish line he can probably hear it.


4:10:26pm EST (11:10am local): Victory! With a chip time of 6:08:35, Hideki Okajima completed his first marathon. Wear your medal with pride-not many people drive 26.2 miles in a day, let alone run it. Congratulations.

And as race photos go, this one isn't too bad.

42 K!

According to this article, Hideki Okajima will be running in the Honolulu Marathon on Sunday (he's not listed as an official participant, however.) I'm not sure if it's his first attempt at 26.2 but, as a runner, I'm very excited for him. The more I think about it though, the more I worry about the amount of training he would have put in during the season (an eighteen-week training program would have started back in August) and about the possibility of him getting hurt. Hopefully, he trained well and doesn't go out too fast. Finish strong.

Silver Lining.

I suppose one thing to take away from that game is that the bullpen, with the exception of Mike Timlin (whom I don't see earning himself a post-season roster spot, anyway), was good tonight. And a good bullpen is vital.

Okajima's first inning was cake. He had trouble in his second but in came Justin Masterson. I just wanted to hug the big lug or buy him a drink or something (though in his goody-two-shoes-ness he probably doesn't drink) after he got out of a bases-loaded-one-out jam with a strike out of the only good batter the Rays have and a ground out. He strutted out there for the ninth inning (and with the help of Kevin Cash) mowed them down.

And then it was Manny Delcarmen's turn. *Gulp* Manny Del did Dennis Eckersley proud. Eck has said repeatedly that Manny Del is too good to be scared of batters and tonight he wasn't. He got a strike out, a ground out-with some heads up fielding by Delcarmen, and a fly out in the tenth. And in the eleventh got a ground out-with some slick fielding by Lowrie, a strike out, gave up a double, but got a ground out to end the inning.

Then came old buddy Javier Lopez. On Javier's birthday I promised to try to be nicer to him but if he continues to pitch like he did tonight, and has been doing recently, I probably won't have to try. Javier got through his first inning with two ground outs and a strike out. He gave up a double and a walk to start off his second inning but then got a double play and ground out to finish it off. He even came out for the first batter of the fourteenth inning and got a strike out.

Granted, the Rays aren't the Angels or even what Chicago was a couple of weeks ago in terms of hitting. But it's all good stuff to see.

Lowell and Varitek in Washington

After their visit with W, Lowell and Varitek answered some questions.

Lowell touched on a number of topics, starting with how much he enjoyed his visit today. He said that he thought that W was a funny guy, he spoke about why he re-signed with Boston, and said that he looking forward to next season. He really comes across as very suave.

Varitek also answered some questions. He talked about enjoying this trip more than the visit after 2004, appreciating the opportunity to visit the Walter Reed Hospital, and why the Red Sox are awesome. He doesn't come as suave as Lowell.

I don't know why they had Okajima standing between them. Maybe he answered some questions before the video started. He came across as very quiet.

Hideki Okajima, no. 37

Birth Date: December 25, 1975 in Kyoto, Japan

Height/Weight: 6'1", 195 lbs.

Contract: 2 years at $2.5 million (through 2008)

Okajima played in 66 games last season; during which he pitched 69 innings. He faced 272 batters and Struck Out 63 of them (23%). 50 of those batters got hits off him, 6 of which were home runs. He walked 17 batters and hit one with a pitch. He allowed 17 runs, all of them earned. All of which resulted in a very impressive Walks and Hits per Inning Pitched of only .971.

In Japan he played ten seasons for the Yomiuri Giants and one season with the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters (tee hee). He was mostly a set up man in Japan, though he did occasionally work as a starter. He has a fast ball that sits in the mid to high eighties, he has a splitter in the low eighties, and a curve ball in the low to mid seventies. His best pitch is his changeup, which sits in the low eighties.

Francona has described Okajima as quiet and cautious. In Japan he was known for being serious. He seems very polite, very respectful, very Japanese. He seems very sweet; when he first arrived at spring training last season, he admitted to liking romantic movies citing Ghost, Pretty Woman, and Autumn in New York as his favorites (possibly those were the last ones that he'd seen or the first that occurred to him.)

I think that next season probably won't be as successful for Okajima. Part of the allure of Japanese pitchers is that the first year they're here they can be hard for American batters to figure out; during their second season, however, that element of surprise (if you like) is gone and they become much more hittable. He seems intelligent, though, so maybe he can beat the pattern.

Otanjou-bi Omedetou Gozaimasu!

1.) It means: Happy Birthday, person I don't know particularly well! It was intended for Hideki Okajima, whose 32 birthday is today. But I suppose you could also apply it to Jesus, if that's the way you swing.

2.) This was my brother's Christmas Eve present:

It's a set of Boston Red Sox Uno cards. In and of itself, it's kind of neat. For the most part, it's just normal Uno but the cards have pictures of Sox players on them (not being rule readers, we didn't know what to do with the Daisuke card but that's beside the point.) This is the point:

You can't see it clearly (because I have a crappy camera) but that is a picture of Alex Cora. Someone over at MLB merchandising, however, seems to believe that his name is Alex Cara. Along the ellipse, under his left hand, they've spelt his name CARA. I even thought that maybe the licensing had been agreed to via implied, oral consent and was, therefore, unofficial. But nope, there was a nifty little hologram on the back of the package and a claim that it was official. Seriously people, how do you get that wrong?

A Year in Review with Hideki Okajima

For the past two days, the Globe has run a transcript of a radio interview that Okajima did back home in Japan. It was translated by Globe staffer Daigo Fujiwara and can be found here and here.

He spoke about being uncomfortable at the beginning of the season, being willing to adapt as the situation warrants, a hint about the bullpen, and the grueling season. And he's just so wonderfully Japanese; he's not out there for individual glory but for the good of the team.

It was good to hear from him because I don't recall hearing a single word out of his mouth (or, really, out of his translator's) during the whole season. It was good to learn a little bit about who he is, what he's about.

And big surprise here: I like him. He seems diplomatic, though that might just be the Japanese-thing. [Aside: I have a theory as to why Japanese people are so friggin polite. In spoken Japanese, there are a lot of words that are deemed unnecessary and can just be left out of the sentence. A subject? You don't need a subject. Why in the world would you possibly want to know who (or what) I'm talking about? So in order to avoid confusion, anything that might be slightly controversial is just not discussed.] He also seems smart and not just baseball smart. He figured out what he needed to do to succeed and then did it. Although, sharing his pitching secrets with the world might not have been the best idea.

I think it bodes well for his continued success. It seems to me that a lot of Japanese pitchers come over here and are lights out for a year, only to be figured out by the American batters the next and become really hittable. If he's willing to learn new pitches and relocate his spots, then he might be able to avoid that.

Lastly, I know that it's an old joke, but Nippon Ham Fighters gets me every time.