A Brief History
On October 28, 2004, Seattle Mariners star Ichiro Suzuki, the first major league baseball (MLB) player to come from Japan, broke George Sisler’s treasured 84-year-old record by hitting 262 balls for base hits in one season. Suzuki, better known simply as Ichiro, had come to the U.S. to play professional baseball after already being a star in Japan.
Digging Deeper
Starting with being named the American League (AL) Rookie of the Year in 2001, Ichiro made an impression on American baseball that will be hard to forget. 10 seasons in a row he smacked 200 or more hits (a record). He has been an American League most valuable player (MVP), an All-Star 10 times and also an All-Star Game MVP. He is also the only player to have hit an inside-the-park home run during an All-Star game.
Ichiro has been awarded the Gold Glove 10 straight years in a row and has won the Silver Slugger 3 times. At 225, he holds the records for singles in a season, and 7 times has he had hitting streaks of 20 or more games. He is the active leader in stolen bases and even holds a Stolen Base title. If his hits in the Japanese major league were counted as well, Ichiro would rank 3rd of all time behind Pete Rose and Ty Cobb in career hits. Suzuki has definitely earned himself a shoo-in status when it comes time to vote him into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
So, what other MLB players come from outside the U.S.? History and Headlines Fact: As of 2013-2014, roughly a quarter of all major league baseball players have been born outside of the U.S. They come from 45 different countries, but most of them hail from South America, Mexico, the Caribbean, Japan, Korea and Canada. (Of course, Puerto Rico also produces great baseball players, but it is a territory of the United States.)
Here are some older, legendary foreign-born MLB players who are also “hall of famers”:
Luis Tiant, a Cuban immigrant, was an ace pitcher for the Cleveland Indians and Boston Red Sox. (He also had some shorter stints for 4 other teams). The Red Sox have enshrined him in their team Hall of Fame.
The Dominican Republic has produced great major league stars, notably Sammy Sosa of the Chicago White Sox and Chicago Cubs (and 3 other teams). When he slammed 63 dingers in 1999, he became only 1 of 3 players who have managed to beat Babe Ruth’s 60 homers and Roger Maris’ 61 homers in one season. The following year he led the major leagues in homers with 50. Due to a drug test controversy, however, Sosa has not yet received the necessary votes to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.
Ferguson Jenkins, pitcher for the Chicago Cubs, who retired in 1983, is Canadian born. He won 20 games a total of 7 times, with 6 of the times being in a row. Jenkins is the only pitcher to have struck out 3,000 batters while walking less than 1,000, quite a feat. Obviously, he is in the Hall of Fame. In fact, he was the first Canadian to be inducted into it.
Bert Blyleven, former ace pitcher for the Minnesota Twins and Cleveland Indians, hails from the Netherlands. (Do the Dutch even know what baseball is?) Bert is in the Hall of Fame as well.
Other foreign-born Hall of Famers include; Juan Marichal (pitcher) from the Dominican Republic; Luis Aparicio (shortstop) from Venezuela; Rod Carew from the Panama Canal Zone who had 3,000 hits; and Tony Perez who actually harvested sugar cane in Cuba before joining the major leagues.
The U.S. has also seen an influx of foreign born players in the National Football League (NFL) and the National Basketball Association (NBA). It seems that all of these games that were once considered so typically American have gone international. Now, it would be great if there were more teams based in other countries. (Yes, we are aware of the Toronto Blue Jays, but we mean even more other countries outside of North America.) Where do you predict the next foreign team will be?
Question for students (and subscribers): Who is your favorite foreign-born baseball player? Please let us know in the comments section below this article.
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Major League Baseball. The Major League Baseball Ultimate Book of Records: An Official MLB Publication. FENN-M&S, 2013.
Suzuki, Ichiro. Ichiro on Ichiro. Sasquatch Books, 2004.
