Brewers show interest in 39yo Japanese pitcher

[Thurston Fluff]

Looking at his stats doesn't really thrill me but I don't know how much his stats matter given he would most likely be a loogy. All we have to go on is what he did facing both righties and lefties. If someone has his right/left splits that might be more telling.

[crewcrazy]

Hopefully if the Brewers do sign him he'll pitch more like Hideki Okajima than Keiichi Yabu. I managed to find year-by-year stats for him:

 

Year Team W L SV ERA G IP SO

1995 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 4 4 0 3.90 39 90.0 54

1996 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 2 1 1 4.96 24 52.2 40

1997 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 3 4 0 4.79 34 62.0 35

1998 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 3 8 0 3.83 41 101.0 76

1999 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 3 7 0 4.68 36 102.0 90

2000 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 5 9 4 3.93 50 112.1 88

2001 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 10 8 0 4.27 30 173.0 132

2002 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 9 14 0 3.84 26 173.1 142

2003 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 9 8 0 3.66 24 167.0 127

2004 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 3 10 0 5.53 18 96.0 66

2005 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 0 2 0 9.45 14 26.2 14

2006 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 2 3 0 4.70 54 46.0 40

2007 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 5 4 0 3.70 22 112.0 74

2008 Hiroshima Toyo Carp 8 5 0 3.50 21 115.2 71

 

His career W/L and ERA stats may be misleading, since he's a pretty significant part of his career as a starter. Obviously, I don't think the Brewers would be looking at him as a starter given his age, but there are some rumors out there saying teams like the Mets may be interested in plugging him into the rotation.

[sbrylski]

crewcrazy, did they have his walk rates listed too at all?

[crewcrazy]

I got the above stats from this site, but it also looks like another site has more expansive stats, sans the 2008 season.

 

1995 - 90 IP, 54 SO, 45 BB

1996 - 52.2 IP, 40 SO, 20 BB

1997 - 62.0 IP, 35 SO, 34 BB

1998 - 101.0 IP, 76 SO, 46 BB

1999 - 102.0 IP, 90 SO, 40 BB

2000 - 112.1 IP, 88 SO, 57 BB

2001 - 173 IP, 132 SO, 60 BB

2002 - 173.1 IP, 142 SO, 38 BB

2003 - 167.0 IP, 127 SO, 36 BB

2004 - 96.0 IP, 66 SO, 24 BB

2005 - 26.2 IP, 14 SO, 9 BB

2006 - 46.0 IP, 40 SO, 16 BB

2007 - 112.0 IP, 74 SO, 36 BB

 

Not too bad, with the highest totals coming when he was starting (although that 2002 season almost looks like a Dave Bush line). He did give up a lot of hits throughout his career if you look at the second link, but it's hard to figure out if he was just playing with bad defenses due to the lack of Japanese stats out there.

[sbrylski]

Still can't quite figure out a way to praise this guy, other than saying he's not horrible. He was decent as a starter last year, yet held a very mediocre K rate. In the two most recent years he pitched exculsively out of the pen (2005, 06) were basically his worst years, though a smaller sample.

 

I can't call him anything more than a Dave Burba/Rick Helling (during their time with the Brewers) at best.

[dpapo]

We can put this rumor to rest.

 

"Melvin did slam the door shut Tuesday on one rumor that the Brewers were interested in 39-year-old Japanese left-hander Ken Takahashi. "We're not involved with any Japanese players," Melvin said."

 

http://milwaukee.brewers....mp;fext=.jsp&c_id=mil