FORT MYERS, Fla. — Less than 16 hours after Shohei Ohtani defeated Mike Trout to close out the World Baseball Classic, one of Team Japan’s victorious heroes arrived at the Red Sox camp on Wednesday, with three words for manager Alex Cora .
“I’m tired,” Masataka Yoshida said as he accidentally ran into Cora’s daily media frenzy.
“Congratulations,” Cora told him as they hugged. “Well done. I told you so!”
In fact, Cora had been saying since spring training began that Japan would be at least one of the last remaining teams, and their thrilling run to the title became a showcase of the country’s remarkable talent. Ohtani was the headliner, but Yoshida was right in the middle. Yoshida, 29, hit clean and played at left field — just as he will for the Red Sox this season — and was named to the All-WBC team with a .409 batting average and a tournament-record 13 RBIs. Yoshida reached base in more than half of his plate appearances, and his triple home run in the semifinals was the deciding factor in advancing Japan into the championship game.
For his new teammates, watching from Red Sox camp, the performance was eye-opening.
“Just a professional, professional racquet of the highest order,” Justin Turner said. “It was incredible how he controlled the hitting zone, how he used the whole field, how he hits with runners in goal position, how he takes his stride. It was pretty impressive.”
Yoshida’s semifinal home run came on a difficult left-to-left pitch from Cardinals replacement JoJo Romero, who pitched for Team Mexico. The pitch was low and inside, right on the corner of the hitting zone, and Yoshida managed to drive it and keep it fair.
“Incredible,” Rafael Devers said, while the rest of his reaction was relayed by translator Carlos Villoria Benitez. “This momentum is natural. There’s nothing forced about it, and it’s a unique swing. So when you see him taking that approach on this pitch, it’s really good.
And it came in a big moment of a must-win game.
“He’s pretty grippy,” Trevor told Story. “That was a big three-run home run. And just the way he stays on the ball is amazing. You can tell he’s not afraid to score with two shots and shooting the ball the other way is a big weapon of his. It makes me excited to see what he can do at Fenway.”
The Red Sox aggressively pursued Yoshida this offseason, signing a $90 million deal that some in the industry called overpaid – Andrew Benintendi signed for $15 million less – but which the Red Sox saw as a worthwhile gamble given Yoshida’s dependable base skills and potential for surprising power. Yoshida had shown this power in batting practice during the first two weeks of spring training, but he was able to apply it in games during the WBC.
“It was really great to see that he has great bats under pressure,” Red Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom said. “To see the peace in the box. To see the ability to use the entire field. The Two Strike Approach. The power. Basically to see some of the things that our scouts have been seeing for years.”
And he did it in style. Cora said he noticed when Yoshida backtracked a hard fly ball into midfield, but Cora also noted the cool and casual way he threw the ball back into the infield after catching routine fly balls down the left flank .
“You saw him flip the ball,” Cora said. “Like Ichiro.”
Yoshida may not live up to Ichiro Suzuki’s immediate impact in the big leagues — Ichiro was the MVP in his rookie season — but the Red Sox don’t believe his performance at the World Baseball Classic was an outlier. He had 0.957 career OPS in Japan, with 1.007 OPS last season. The Red Sox made him their biggest offseason signing. They announced early in spring training that he would bat mid-sequence. In the WBC, he played for Team Japan, but he did so as a member of the Red Sox organization.
“One of the cool things about seeing it as a leader is we get to cheer for our guys who represent their countries, but we also feel like they’re representing us,” Bloom said. “I hope it was also cool for our fans who saw him to get to know him a little bit and see some of the things that we saw. Of course it doesn’t count for the Red Sox, but it’s really cool to see him showing what he can do.”
Upon his return to Red Sox camp, Yoshida is scheduled to return to the lineup Friday night and take Saturday off. It’s likely he’ll play in at least two of the last three spring training games before the team breaks camp on Wednesday. Cora said the priority is to give Yoshida replays in left field, particularly at JetBlue Park where he can get used to replicating the green monster. He’ll get at-bats, of course, but the Red Sox don’t need to see much more of him in the batter’s box. They’re confident he can score.
“It was fun to watch (WBC),” Cora said. “But now it’s time to bring him over here and let the fun begin here.”
(Top photo of Yoshida signing autographs: Nathan Ray Seebeck/USA Today)