Read The Meaning of Ichiro for Free Online

demonstrating exceptional foot speed, stole 29 bases. He was chosen the Pacific League
     MVP and awarded a Gold Glove for his fine defensive efforts in center field, where he had unveiled the best throwing arm in
     the Japanese game.
    It was in 1994 that he also officially became known by the handle “Ichiro,” rather than Suzuki—which was the second most common
     surname in Japan. It was a PR stunt dreamed up by Ogi and an Orix coach in an effort to change the image of a team that had
     grown weak and complacent, as well as to separate their new outfielder from the anonymous clutter of all the other Suzukis
     in Nippon Professional Baseball. It was an idea Ichiro initially thought frivolous. He found it embarrassing to be introduced
     that way over the PA system. By the end of the season, however, with Ichiro a household word and commercial endorsement offers
     flooding in, he did not want to be called anything else.
    The following year, picking up where he left off, he propelled the BlueWave to their first pennant in 12 years and copped
     his second MVP in a row. He topped the league in hitting again, with a .342 average, and led in RBIs with 80. What’s more,
     he belted 25 home runs, while upping his number of stolen bases to 49.
    By this time, he was so famous it was difficult for him to walk the streets of Kobe, now, tragically, reduced to rubble in
     many neighborhoods by the great earthquake of 1995, which had collapsed the city’s overhead highway and turned many of the
     downtown office buildings into grotesque shells of twisted metal, leaving some 300,000 people—one-fifth of the metropolitan
     population—homeless. Ichiro had quietly donated considerable amounts of money out of his own pocket to help in the relief
     effort.
    Basking in the reflected brilliance of Ichiro’s luminosity was
pater
Nobuyuki, who attended every Orix home game he could, making the two-hour drive west from Nagoya. He had just authored a
     book,
Musuko Ichiro
(My Son Ichiro), in which he recounted his relationship with his son, and, in the process, turned the Airport Batting Center
     into a tourist attraction. As a result of that tome’s substantial sales, he had become a minor celebrity himself, fielding
     dozens of media requests every day. He could be seen sitting in the infield stands at Green Stadium Kobe signing autographs
     for fans and being interviewed by sports reporters. However, it was a turn of events that embarrassed Ichiro. He complained
     to his father, who subsequently moved to the outfield bleachers, where he might be less easily spotted.
    The press had dubbed Ichiro the “Human Batting Machine” and he continued to do justice to the name, putting together the most
     impressive skein of hitting seen in Japan since the heyday of Sadaharu Oh. In 1996, he batted .356, won his third straight
     MVP and led his team to victory in the Japan Series over the Yomiuri Giants. In 1997, moving to third in the batting order,
     he hit .345. A year later it was .358, then .343 and .387 after that. That made seven batting titles in a row, baby, an unprecedented
     feat in the NPB, as was his aggregate batting average over that period of .353. He had become such an adroit, dexterous hitter
     that he was downright eerie at times. In 1997, for example, he went two entire months—216 plate appearances in all—without
     striking out. In the 1999 season, he managed to get hits on 70 percent of the strikes he swung at—an esoteric if nonetheless
     astonishing baseball statistic. His bat control was so good that in one game in the year 2000, he hit a pitch that bounced
     in front of home plate for a single to the outfield (the video highlight of this sensational hit is often played these days
     on American television). Ichiro believed himself on the verge of hitting .400, something that had never been done in Japan.
     By then the press had come up with another word for him:
kaibutsu
(monster). It was praise of the highest order.
Hip