Word: shortstop
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...Kazuo Matsui is baseball's yojimbo, a free agent from Japan with more suitors than a Muromachi-era princess. No fewer than nine major league teams-including rivals the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox-are reportedly in the running for the services of the 1.75-m shortstop. The question brewing on hot stoves on two continents is not just where this bat-and-glove for hire will wind up but also whether he's willing to change positions or play in the shadow of another Japanese star...
...Kazuo's being dubbed Little Matsui)-has won four Gold Gloves, batted better than .300 for seven straight years, hit at least 20 homers in each of the past four seasons and stolen 30 or more bases five times. In a millennium poll, fans voted him the greatest Japanese shortstop ever. He was 24 at the time...
...drafted by the Seibu Lions and turned into a shortstop. In his second year in the minors he came up for a cup of kohee. He figured he would quickly be farmed back out. Instead he became the protégé of Hiroshi Narahara, the Japanese Ozzie Smith...
...Swag is not a problem for the woeful Mets, who covet Matsui and are willing to move their top young player, shortstop José Reyes, to second. The Mariners are flush with cash and short at short but seem more intrigued by free-agent pivotman Miguel Tejada, the 2002 American League...
Here's a trade deficit that the WTO can't fix. Every year, it seems, Japan sends its best baseball player to America's major leagues while the U.S. ships back geriatric has-beens and misfits. This year is no different. The latest Japanese export is skillful, switch-hitting shortstop Kazuo Matsui, who announced on Nov. 17 that he would leave the Seibu Lions and sign with an American team. "It's been my dream to play in the majors," says Matsui, sounding like a replay of the 2002 announcement by the New York Yankees' Hideki Matsui. (No relation...