Kikuchi used to babysit newest Japanese phenom

This story was excerpted from Keegan Matheson’s Blue Jays Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

Rintaro Sasaki could be the next Japanese baseball sensation.

As his countryman, Yusei Kikuchi, pitched Tuesday night in Milwaukee for the Blue Jays, Sasaki launched his first home run in the United States, a towering blast with the Trenton Thunder of the MLB Draft League.

Sasaki has done what Kikuchi flirted with doing 15 years ago, when the decision was even more controversial. He’s foregone the NPB Draft in Japan and chosen to come stateside, where he’ll play NCAA ball at Stanford. If he’d stayed home to play in Japan, he would have had to wait for his NPB club to post him, or wait until he became a free agent after nine years of service time.

Kikuchi stood in this same spot in 2009, as one of Japan’s great young pitchers, but he ultimately chose to stay in Japan, where he pitched for the Saitama Seibu Lions. In 2018, Kikuchi was posted by the Lions and signed with the Mariners. The year prior, Shohei Ohtani, who went to the same high school as Kikuchi -- Hanamaki Higashi High School -- was posted by the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters.

After Kikuchi’s win Tuesday -- and after he’d sipped a glass of Yamazaki, one of Japan’s finest whiskies -- he was asked about the young Sasaki.

“My high school coach [Hiroshi Sasaki], who has done a lot for me, that’s his son,” Kikuchi said through interpreter Yusuke Oshima. “When I was in high school, [Rintaro] was 3 years old. I’ve been able to give him some advice here and there, even last year, when he was debating whether to come overseas or stay and get drafted by an NPB team. He’s like a little brother to me. I spent some time babysitting him when I was young, too. My motivation is to keep pitching in the Majors until he gets to the Majors as well.”

There’s such a beauty to the Japanese game. It comes from how these players respect and admire one another between generations, but also how Japanese baseball fans support their stars, particularly those who come to MLB. On days when Kikuchi starts a road game, it’s not uncommon for Japanese media to far outnumber the traveling Canadian media, covering his every move with such care. For Ohtani, you can multiply that by 10.

In a few years, that could be Sasaki.

Sasaki hammered 140 home runs in his high school career, shattering Kotaro Kiyomiya’s record of 111. He’s built like a young Prince Fielder, with a gorgeous, powerful swing from the left side. From his position to his physique, he couldn’t be more different than Kikuchi, but the two share a special bond that Kikuchi hopes to maintain.

“I’ve never hit a home run in my life, so I don’t know what it’s like to hit a home run, but he broke the record in Japan by hitting 140 home runs over there in high school. I hit none,” Kikuchi said, cracking a smile. “When I was in NPB, I got three hits. I gave one of my bats that I got a hit with to him. I gifted it to him and told him to try to surpass me [in NPB]. He still hasn’t surpassed me, so we’ll see how he does.”

Earlier this season, we saw Japanese stars face off when Kikuchi and Ohtani went head-to-head in Toronto. There’s nothing coincidental about Kikuchi touching 98.2 mph in Ohtani’s first trip to the plate, the fourth-hardest pitch of his career. But Ohtani had to one-up his countryman. He blasted a single through the right side of the Blue Jays’ infield on that pitch with the hardest exit velocity he’s recorded in his big league career (119.2 mph).

Anything you can do, I can do better.

“Of course there was a little extra adrenaline when I faced him,” Kikuchi said at the time. “I think I threw my best fastball this year, but the exit velocity off his bat came out pretty good as well. He got the best of me there, but I was glad I was able to get him out after that.”

The press box was packed with Japanese media that night, covering every move Ohtani and Kikuchi made. It’s almost impossible to find a comparison for that passion in North American pro sports, but it’s part of what makes the Japanese game great.

Kikuchi turns 33 on Monday. If he can keep going -- and few players on the planet are in better shape -- perhaps he can get his wish to one day strike out the big kid he used to babysit.