Ichiro Suzuki, the Seattle outfielder who insisted his failure to accumulate 200 hits last season never crossed his mind, has put an entirely different slant on 2011 in the Japanese media.
For the first time in his 11-year big-league career, Ichiro failed to bat .300 last year, didn’t make the All-Star team or win a Gold Glove.
“I felt desperate last season,” the Nikkan Sports quoted Ichiro this week. “That doesn’t happen to me very often. Mental stress is a lot worse than physical stress.
“If you are going to call yourself a professional, you need to put up results.”
Ichiro, desperate?
After the final game of the Mariners’ 67-95 season, Ichiro bridled at any suggestion by local writers that he’d felt pressure to continue his 10-year streak of piling up 200 or more hits a year.
“It’s a little strange because this year I’ve never mentioned about 200, ever, during the season or during spring training. Nor did I mention that during last year …” Ichiro said then. “I feel communication is very tough because I have never mentioned that nor have I thought about that.”
Never thought about it? Someone asked Ichiro if that meant Northwest reporters were wrong to think he’d felt pressure in 2011.
“Yes, wrong by a lot. That said, I don’t think you guys have enough imagination,” Ichiro said.
In Japan this week, however, Ichiro’s take had changed.
“Sometimes I feel I’m getting older, or more sensitive to what they say on TV,” Ichiro said. “Yes my skin gets dry, but it’s a lame conclusion to blame everything on age. People are quick to point to age. Those kinds of people don’t interest me.
“In many cases, those people can’t even take care of themselves.”
One thing did not change – Ichiro declined to analyze his season for the American or Japanese media. By the standards he’d set, it was easily the worst of his career.
Ichiro finished 2011 with 184 hits in 161 games, and a .272 batting average that was 59 points below his career average when the season began.
The closest Ichiro came to describing his frustration was in telling the Japanese press about last April – when he hit .328.
“I didn’t feel good at the plate but I continued getting hits in April,” he said. “It was the most difficult start (to a season) I could think of. It’s hard to judge in April if what you’ve been working on in spring training was right.
“I thought I was right because I was getting hits, but it takes time to work out what went wrong. There was a gulf between my stats and the way I was feeling.”
It was the only month last season Ichiro batted .300. And for a player accustomed to finishing seasons strong, Ichiro batted .268 in September.
Hits and hitting, he said, have a daily impact upon him during the season.
“If I can get two or three hits every day, I’ll never feel tired. One hit relieves my stress, more than one hour of massage,” Ichiro said.
Now 38, Ichiro’s career has likely reached a tipping point. Next month he’ll open spring training in the last year of his contract with Seattle – one that will pay him $18 million – amid talk that he might open the 2012 season batting somewhere other than leadoff.
larry.larue@thenewstribune.com
blog.thenewstribune.com/mariners
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