On the horizon: Bobby Valentine, back in Japan as a manager, sees the Pacific Rim playing a big role in making the majors a truly international league

Sporting News, The, Feb 23, 2004 by Brad Lefton

Bobby Valentine was 10 years ahead of the game in 1995.

Only weeks into his first spring training as a manager in Japan, he boldly tried to trade for a young player who quickly caught his eye--a little rookie shortstop for the Seibu Lions with blazing speed and good instincts named Kazuo Matsui.

Seibu knew what kind of gem it had in Matsui and promptly declined, but Valentine surely was alone in his evaluation among his major league peers at the time. With more than a little irony, Matsui and Valentine crossed paths again recently, this time somewhere over the Pacific; the shortstop heading to the States to begin a career with Valentine's former team, the Mets, and the skipper traveling back to the Far East to become the first foreigner to manage in Japan twice.

The chance to remain well-connected to the game's emerging trends motivates the curious Valentine to return to Japan. As baseball's international scope continues to widen, Asia clearly will be a hot spot for the rest of his career.

"I think there'll be an actual division of major league baseball in Asia someday," says Valentine, 53. "I want to see how feasible that could be with my own eyes. I'm intrigued by that concept, and I'm excited about the entire package of experiences this opportunity offers me."

Valentine has been overseeing the Chiba Lotte Marines' workouts since the club opened spring training on February 1. He takes over a team that finished one game below .500 and 14 games out of first place last season. The franchise last won a championship in 1974 and has had just four second-place Pacific League finishes since. The most recent one was when Valentine managed it in '95. This time, he signed a three-year contract with a team option for two more seasons reportedly worth $6.4 million.

Even though his Lotte club plays far off the beaten path in a distant suburb of Tokyo, Valentine is in a position to feel the pulse of baseball across Asia. The Marines' corporate owner, Lotte, is a Korean maker of confections. It has owned a team in the Japan leagues for 36 years and also has an entry in the Korean league. There is serious talk that Valentine's team will open the 2005 season with two games in Korea for the first time. Two of the better starting pitchers for rival Seibu are Taiwanese, and the emerging baseball market of China is nearby.

But even more significant than all that, Valentine has been cast in the sequel to the "Godzilla" drama that played in New York last year when Hideki Matsui signed with the Yankees and Japan went bonkers. The sequel is the "Lion King," the nickname of Seung-Yeop Lee, Korea's favorite baseball star. Lotte signed him in the offseason after he walloped an Asian-record 56 home runs and led the Korean league with 144 RBIs. He brings a career .305 average and six consecutive 35-plus home run seasons to Lotte.

This time, Lee's talents were no secret, and Valentine had to compete with major league teams for his services. The Dodgers and Mariners courted the slugger, but he eventually found Lotte's offer of two years and $5 million irresistible. The 27-year-old also likes the idea of learning under an American manager who can help hone his skills for a career later in the States.

Although one major league scout soured on Lee after watching him in the 2000 Olympics and the 2003 Olympic qualifying tournament, Ted Heid, the Mariners' director of Pacific Rim scouting, insists that "Bobby's acquisition of Lee is one of the best free-agent signings on either side of the Pacific this offseason."

Korean fans are even more upbeat. Their excitement translates into a hefty media entourage, and Lotte is negotiating to have all its games televised in Korea for the first time. Valentine appreciates the hoopla.

"With the big Korean media contingent covering him, it will really help unify these two countries in terms of baseball. To me, that's an exciting development, and I'd like to be a part of it," he says. "I had a wonderful experience with a Korean pitcher on the Mets, Jae Weong Seo, and I'm looking forward to working with Lee."

The addition of Lee also presents Valentine with the first old-fashioned American problem of his second term: Who's on first? Lee has told Japanese papers he wants to start, but the position already is occupied by Kazuya Fukuura, a .300 hitter with decent power who, like Lee, also bats lefthanded. Alas, the problem might get an American solution: Valentine's Pacific League employs the designated hitter.

As Valentine surveys the climate for baseball's future in Asia, he'll quickly notice some impressive upgrades since he last wore a Japan league uniform. The Kintetsu Buffaloes and Nippon Ham Fighters have moved into spacious new domed stadiums, making all Pacific League parks fewer than 25 years old and further changing the dated image of cramped ballparks that yield easy home runs. Valentine also will sense a hearty appetite for international baseball when his club opens its season March 27 at Seibu amid great hoopla: The Yankees and Devil Rays will be in town preparing to open their major league seasons three days later in Tokyo.