The possiblity of a WORLD series.

[Thurston Fluff]

Bud Selig is open to a series between the world series champions and the Japanese World series champions. I think it would be pretty cool. In a way it'd be like the beginning of the Superbowl era in football. I think that has much more appeal than the baseball world cup which is more of an exhibition where many of the best players don't want to play in. A Japanese/American WS would be national pride and real evidence of which country has the best baseball. There would actually be some amount of pressure since it's hard to call yourself world champions if another team beat s you in a best of 7. link

[Point Beer Is Best]

I think this would be great. It's pretty ethnocentric to call our baseball/basketball champions "World" champions when there are highly competitive leagues in other nations (football being the exception here). Due to the amount of travel, I can see alternating which nation hosts the event each year. Would probably have to be held either in dome or moderate climate state (like the Superbowl) when hosted here. Probably a pipe dream, but hosting an event like this at Miller Park would be incredible, even if it's just once.

 

I'm not that familiar with Japanese baseball, but are there any major rule discrepancies between the two (i.e., the DH rule in the AL vs. pitchers hit in the NL)?

[Funketown]

I would think that out of 100 games against the Japanese champions, the MLB champions would win about 70. Just looking at the stat comparisons of players going from Japan to the US (Akinori Iwamura, Kosuke Fukudome, Kei Igawa, Ichiro Suzuki, Daisake Matsuzaka, etc.), it wouldn't surprise me if the true level of play in those leagues is somewhere around AAA ball.

 

I know Baseball Prospectus has looked at this for the Cuban league, and argued that the level of play there is similar to A-/A+. Does anybody know if they've done the same for the Japanese league?

[owbc]

I would love to see this, but there would be lots of issues to work out. The MLB playoffs are already getting too long, so to add another 5-7 game series on top of an 8-month season might be unpopular. The other concern is that some of the excitement of the original World Series (or MLB championship or whatever they would rename it) would go away, since it would no longer signal the end of the season. The idea of resting your pitchers/players in game 6 or 7 of the World Series would be a shocking change. At the same time, it would be an admission that it is important to grow baseball to the next level that only soccer has reached--where various league champions from different countries would eventually play each other. As for the DH, I think Japan ironically has the same problem as MLB, where one league uses it and the other does not.

[ccbrew]

The Pacific League uses the DH, while the Central League does not. So it is indeed the same problem as MLB - during interleague play and the Japan Series they play by the home team's rules.

 

One thing to keep in mind about Japanese players (especially pitchers) that come to the MLB is that hardly any of them are making it over during their prime. Because of Japanese FA rules, most only get to the States by the time they are 29-30. Considering many of the top players regularly make the jump straight from HS to the pros when they are 18, they have already peaked by the time they have their opportunity to play in the MLB.

[Invader3K]

I just am not that interested in it. I am not trying to sound jingoistic, but I have a feeling the "MLB Champions" would end up trouncing the Japanese Champions. Such a series would also take away from the World Series' importance, and that would be very bad for MLB in the long run. I also think that by the time the World Series wraps up, most fans are ready for the off-season and the Hot Stove. I would guess most MLB players would also hate the idea of all the extra travel, and the MLBPA would probably have major issues with it. Perhaps an exhibition game (or two or three) between the two champions would be more viable and palatable than another full on championship series tacked on after the World Series.

 

Also, I have never understood the angst of calling the MLB Champions the "World Champions". MLB is basically the oldest organized pro baseball league around, and features players from all over the world. Calling it the "World Series" is more tradition than anything, regardless.

 

Personally, I like the spirit of the World Baseball Classic. I think it could stand some tweaking, but I think it has the potential to be somewhat on par with the World Cup in terms of what it means to the sport.

[dlk9s]

Also, I have never understood the angst of calling the MLB Champions the "World Champions". MLB is basically the oldest organized pro baseball league around, and features players from all over the world. Calling it the "World Series" is more tradition than anything, regardless.

Yeah, I don't get why people care so much. It's just a title that sounds good. It's like when people nit-pick over "Most Valuable Player" and start saying, "Well, this guy is more 'valuable' to his team than the guy who obviously had the best season, so he's the MVP." Most Valuable Player is the Best Player.

[Funketown]

One thing to keep in mind about Japanese players (especially pitchers) that come to the MLB is that hardly any of them are making it over during their prime. Because of Japanese FA rules, most only get to the States by the time they are 29-30.

Right, but even just comparing their last season in Japan to their first season in the MLB, there is typically a major drop in production, far more than the typical .3-.5 win which is normal for that age group.

[Thurston Fluff]

Right, but even just comparing their last season in Japan to their first season in the MLB, there is typically a major drop in production, far more than the typical .3-.5 win which is normal for that age group.

 

I don't know how much stock I'd put in that. They are coming to an entirely different league so there is going to be a pretty significant learning curve. Some players have a drop off going from one league to another which is nothing compared to going half way around the world and not knowing any players. Add in the task of assimilating to an completely different culture to boot and I'd be more surprised if there wasn't a drop the first season.

[Funketown]

I don't know how much stock I'd put in that. They are coming to an entirely different league so there is going to be a pretty significant learning curve. Some players have a drop off going from one league to another which is nothing compared to going half way around the world and not knowing any players. Add in the task of assimilating to an completely different culture to boot and I'd be more surprised if there wasn't a drop the first season.

I think the notion of a drop off due to culture shock is reasonable, but overblown. As a hockey fan, this was given the ultimate test when the Soviet Union fell. Players who defected to the NHL (Pavel Bure, Alexander Mogilny, Sergei Federov, Viacheslav Fetisov, Sergei Makarov, etc.) were immediately stars in the NHL. For those unfamiliar with the strength of Soviet hockey, most people believe CSKA Moscow would have been a strong NHL team. Looking back, it seemed that the NHL needed to adjust to the agility and finesse of these players as much as these players had to adjust to the toughness of hockey across the pond. Makarov is a great player to compare to the Japanese baseball players: he came over at age 32, won the Calder Trophy (rookie of the year), and saw his production steadily decline from age 33 - 36.

 

I know baseball is a different sport, and going from the Soviet Union to North America is different than going from Japan to the U.S., but I still believe this to be strong evidence that athletes do not struggle as much with culture shock as it is often said.

 

The transition from the Japanese game to the U.S. game for pitchers is somewhat similar to the transition from the Soviet game to the North American game: Compared to the Japanese pitchers, North Americans rely much more on power, while the Japanese pitchers typically rely on craftiness, just like the Soviet hockey players relied on finesse, craftiness, and agility rather than the brute force of the Canadians.

 

I'll reiterate that baseball is a far different sport from hockey, but I see little reason to believe that if the two leagues were even close to equally matched, there would be little more than the typical drop in production that comes at that age (see: Makarov, Sergei). As I noted, the difference in playing style should not always hurt the Japanese players, as the MLB'ers must also adjust to their game.

[owbc]

From the WBC, it appeared that the differences in style actually favored the Asian pitchers. I think we need to watch it with our superiority complex based on Team USA's lackluster performances in the WBC. The MLB hitters have the advantage of seeing opposing pitchers time and time again while analyzing endless videos of their styles. The Japan-US World Series would have very little advanced scouting and players would have to rely more on what they pick up over the course of a game. Based on that logic, I expect that the series would be highly competitive--with the Japanese champion maybe not being at MLB playoff caliber, but certainly MLB level and capable of winning games.

[bjkrautk]

The real value of the 'World Series' between US and Japan would be an increased availability / interest in the rival league. Over time, the MLB fans of contending teams would have more and more interest in the top rivals across the Pacific. (Like NL & AL fans interest in the other teams pre-Interleague play, or to a lesser extent, American Soccer fans' interest in the Euro leagues.)

 

Given that the same would hold true of Japanese baseball fans, I'm sure that MLB would gladly embrace any chance to drum up interest in games played by non-Japanese players as a way to expand its audience.

[Funketown]

From the WBC, it appeared that the differences in style actually favored the Asian pitchers. I think we need to watch it with our superiority complex based on Team USA's lackluster performances in the WBC.

I guess I don't feel like USA's performance at spring training tournament is any more indicitave of their true talent level than the performance of an MLB team in only 10-15 games.

[Invader3K]

I agree. Especially since many of the international teams had weeks to prepare, while the USA team barely had any time to prepare as a unit.

[Brewtacular]

Bobby Valentine's thoughts

 

"I made a statement last year that my team that won the Japanese championship could have played against the [2005 World Series champion] White Sox," he says, "and some baseball people said, 'Oh, hell, the talent level doesn't match up. Bobby's just talking.' My statement was made in the belief that we were playing at the highest level of any team I'd ever seen play. I knew that without a doubt. We didn't have as much talent -- I never said we did, and I never will -- but with our heart and the way we played, the way we built as a team and built individually during that season, we could have beaten any team in the world."

[Diskono]

Another way to make this work would be to have the competition during the regular season of the *next* year. The previous season's champions could play a series against each other, possibly during interleague weeks or something, sort of like the Champions League.

 

This would cause some scheduling issues, but you could get around that by changing the interleague games into some kind of tournament that plays alongside the regular season (with the added bonus of making interleague play not count in the standings).