Milledge's MLB numbers and youth suggest good things for Tokyo.

I’m not any more willing to predict how well Tokyo’s brand-spanking-new left fielder, Lastings Milledge, will do in NPB than I was about Norichika Aoki and his possible transition to MLB. There are several doubters out there, perhaps due to a collective pessimism related to Aoki’s departure, so I would like to make sure that everyone understands just what type of player the Swallows were able to add to the roster this off-season.

There is little doubt that Lastings Milledge is going to help the team win.

Alrighty then. Let’s start with something that we all agree on. Aoki is one hell of a talent and the team won’t find a commensurate replacement to fill his shoes in center (apologies, Ueda-senshu).

Alright, now let’s move on to something that several of you have already openly disagreed with me on. Lastings Milledge.

I’ve gotta’ say, I’m borderline-ecstatic about the Milledge acquisition, and now please give me a couple of minutes to explain why you should be, too.

First, let’s look at the mediocrity we dealt with (mostly) in left last season. After it was finally determined that Hatakeyama’s range is far too farcical to play him in the outfield, Tokyo started a veritable “who’s who” of second string outfielders. Ueda, Fukuchi, Iihara, Yuichi, Miyade and Hamanaka all got a shot.

Ueda eventually took over and started throughout the playoffs, and he seems to be in the lead for the center field job this year.

Fukuchi featured as a pinch runner for most of the season and led the league in steals for a while before ever collecting his first base hit. Weird.

Iihara, Yuichi and Miyade continued to be Iihara, Yuichi and Miyade, unfortunately. And Hamanaka was a mistake to begin with.

The funny thing is that Hamanaka was actually the opening day left fielder. That didn’t last long.

And the Swallows struggled early in the season with waiting for either Josh Whitesell to stake a claim to first base, or for a second string outfielder to lock down left field. Neither potentiality transpired. Ogawa’s plan of attack ended up being to keep Hatakeyama at first, thus turning Josh into a bench-bound-bat, and allowing left field to turn into a revolving door of OK gloves that can’t hit.

Fukuchi played in 40 games and hit .155/.210/.224 with only nine hits but 10 stolen bags. Iihara had a slash line of .126/.229/.169, and Yuichi clocked in with .193/.270/.291 (in 64 and 51 games, (dis)respectively).

Miyade only remains in management’s good graces because he’s an abnormally tall human being (6’4″/192 cm). His offensive numbers from a limited number of at-bats looked promising, and he also sports a decent arm, but let’s not forget that we traded him to Tohoku (because he plateaued years ago), got cut, and then we re-signed him on the cheap before the 2011 season.

So I think that we can all agree that we have a gaping hole in left. Especially if Ueda, who only played in 12 games toward the end of the regular season, ends up staring in center.

Wonderful. That’s now two things that we agree on.

Last fall, the team was faced with a few options for dealing with the hole in left:

a) Trade for a decent outfielder, but that rarely happens in NPB when you’re talking about players who could have an immediate impact.

b) Promote an in-house minor league player to the starting job in left, but we tried that with Iihara, and he still doesn’t know which way is up.

c) Import a quick fix.

As you’re probably well aware, option c is what NPB teams normally do with corner outfielders and first basemen. We’ve seen it a million times before, and I’m sure that’s exactly what many pundits are thinking when they process the Milledge signing. “Great. We have another AAA guy coming in,” or “He has a chip on his shoulder and hasn’t lived up to the hype.”

Yes, there was a bundle of hype surrounding this guy as he was the youngest player in the National League in 2006. But hear me now. Adjustment issues notwithstanding, Lastings Milledge represents the most talented MLB player to land in NPB since Matt Murton.

Murton, Hanshin’s god-loving, Ichiro’s-single-season-hits-record-breaking right fielder was a bonafide big league player before agreeing to play for the Tigers. What’s my definition of a “bonafide big league player”? It’s someone who was a regular player in the big leagues for the majority of a single season. Murton fits that bill.

Matt Murton was the everyday left fielder for the Chicago Cubs during the 2006 season. In 144 games (508 plate appearances) he hit a mouth-watering .297/.365/.444 and ended the season near the top of several offensive categories for the team. Over five seasons, Murton played in 346 games and notched 1,048 plate appearances. Both of those numbers are way above average for NPB imports. He arrived in Japan at the age of 28, transitioned smoothly, focused on baseball, and has two accolade-drenched seasons to show for it.

The Tokyo Swallows have had several high-quality non-Japanese players on the roster over the past decade. Roberto Petagine (2001 Central League MVP; last played for Fukuoka) and Alex Ramirez (2008-09 CL MVP; now with Yokohama) were there for the team’s most recent Central League Pennant and Japan Series Championship. Tony Barnette, Chang-yong Lim, Aaron Guiel (retired), Josh Whitesell (Chiba), and Seth Greisinger (Chiba) have made solid contributions since then.

Lastings Milledge is definitely within the order of magnitude just listed, and then some. Milledge has featured heavily for two major league teams over the past several years, and he’s still just heading towards his prime. In 2008, at the age of 23, Milledge was the everyday center fielder for the Washington Nationals and hit .268/.330/.402 in 138 games (134 starts; 587 plate appearances) with a .986 fielding percentage.

The 2009 season was split between the Nationals and Pittsburgh, but Lastings was a full-time starter again in 2010 when he played in 113 games (both corners of the outfield) and hit .277/.332/.380 and contributed a fielding percentage of .995 (perfect % in left).

It’s clear that Lastings Milledge compares favorably with Matt Murton who is bar-none the best all-around position player to hit NPB since I’ve been paying attention.

The similarities are striking. Both sought an alternate career advancement route after cutthroat competition shunted them to AAA despite strong top team numbers. Both have a solid work ethic and desire to play day-in and day-out. And both plan to use NPB as a way to play in the big leagues once again (see Colby Lewis).

In other words, they posted big league numbers that project far more confidently in NPB than what we’re used to seeing.

There is one big difference, however. Unlike Murton, who was 28 when he began his NPB career, Milledge will be 26 when he hits the scene in less than a month’s time. Also, compared to Murton’s 346 major league games and 1,048 plate appearances in the majors, Milledge will arrive with 433 games and 1,659 plate appearances under his belt.

And to Milledge’s credit, he’s reportedly on a steady dose of Rosetta Stone and is well ahead of the curve in terms of preparing himself for this fast-approaching shock to the system.

If he can take things in stride half as well as Murton, Barnette, Whitesell and Balentien have, then expect big things from him.

Barring injury or any unforeseen growing pains, Milledge could be NPB’s best position player import since Murton.

So hopefully you now understand why there’s plenty of room for optimism about the situation in left this season. Hopefully you’re now Thrilledged as well.

Milledge had his longest stint at Pittsburgh.

Bio

Born April 5th, 1985 in Bradenton, Florida, Lastings Darnell Milledge was a standout baseball player from a young age and hit the national stage in elementary school when he helped his Little League team, Manatee East, reach the finals of the national tournament in 1997.

Manatee East lost in the finals when Milledge was 12 years old, but he soon made an impact at the international level when he helped the US beat Venezuela for the gold medal in the IBAF’s U16 Baseball World Championship four years later.

Milledge graduated from Lakewood Ranch High School in 2003 after the school’s baseball team was crowned Florida 5A champions.

Professional Baseball

Even though he was touted as the top junior prospect in the nation when he was in 11th grade, his transition to professional baseball was not a smooth one. News that he had been expelled from Northside Christian High School at the age of 17 dogged him and largely prevented him from being selected in the top five after his senior year.

Milledge was drafted in the first round (12th overall) of the 2003 draft by the New York Mets. However,

Milledge started his MLB career in New York.

additional details about his high school expulsion slowed contract negotiations, and he was only able to play in a few games at the tail-end of the 2003 minor league season.

Milledge worked his way through the New York Mets minor league system during the 2004 through 2006 seasons. In 2006, just before his 21st birthday Milledge was the starting right fielder for New York’s triple A affiliate, the Norfolk Tides of the International League.

He was awarded his major league debut on May 30th, 2006 a little less than two months after his 21st birthday. That made him the youngest player in the National League that season, and he would go on to play both left and right field in 56 games while batting .241/.310/.380 for the Mets that season.

His top team action was limited somewhat in 2007 due to a foot injury, and he was traded to the Washington Nationals at the end of the season.

It was with Washington in 2008 that Milledge appeared in a career-best 138 games. He hit .268/.330/.402 that season while working as the team’s everyday center fielder. His strong performance that year was in spite of the fact that he spent a month on the DL due to a groin injury that season.

A slow start to the 2009 season plus an injury while at AAA Syracuse helped convince Washington to trade the 24 year old outfielder to Pittsburgh along with pitcher Joel Hanrahan in exchange for outfielder Nyjer Morgan and pitcher Sean Burnett.

In 2009 he played in only 65 major league games, seven with Washington and 58 for the Pirates after overcoming his injury.

In 2010, Milledge appeared in 113 games for Pittsburgh and played both left (63 games) and right (45 games). However, after hitting .277/.332/.380, the Pirates decided not to extend his contract, and he signed a minor league deal with the Chicago White Sox in February of 2011.

He only appeared in two games for the Sox though, and he spent the remainder of 2011 with the team’s AAA affiliate in Charlotte where he hit .295/.364/.441 in 123 games (444 at-bats). He had 12 homers and 27 stolen bases for the Charlotte Knights in 2011, and he was in the middle of a solid winter league campaign with the Aragua Tigres in Venezuela when he signed with the Tokyo Swallows.

Wecome to Tokyo!

The Tokyo Swallows announced on Tuesday December 27th, 2011 that they had signed 26 year old Lastings Milledge to a two-year contract. It seems like a basic agreement was reached on the seventh of that month, and the Swallows first publicly acknowledged interest in Millege at the beginning of November.

Milledge was brought in to help soften the offensive and defensive blow of losing Norichika Aoki to the Milwaukee Brewers via the posting system.

According to reports at the end of 2011, the Swallows were planning to use him in left field.

Milledge was assigned the number 85 which is the same number that he wore while playing for the Washington Nationals and Pittsburgh Pirates. First base coach Tetsuya Iida gave up the number so that Milledge could have it. Iida switched to the number 88 which was last worn by Tokyo’s former manager and Tsubamegun favorite, Shigeru Takada.

Stats

MLB Offensive Statistics

Key:
NYM = New York Mets
PIT = Pittsburgh Pirates
G = Games
AB = At-bats
R = Runs
H = Hits
2B = Doubles
3B = Triples
HR = Home Runs
RBI = Runs Batted In
SB = Stolen Bases
BB = Walks
HBP = Hit By Pitch
K = Strikeouts
Avg. = Batting Average
OBP = On-Base Percentage
Slg. = Slugging Percentage

Other Milledge News and Notes

Lastings Milledge invited some controversy early in his pro career with the Mets when he was featured in a friend’s rap song involving typical hip hop lyrics. Mets GM Omar Minaya was quite unhappy with the negative PR that ensued, and Milledge was traded following the 2007 season.

The song was produced by one of Milledge’s companies, Soulja Boi Records. However, it doesn’t look like the company has done anything of interest since the controversy in 2007. The company’s website, as of the end of 2011, was still inactive.

In the second half of 2011 Milledge started an LLC with Deon Troupe called Pro Live Connect that attempts to give professional sports fans a chance to interact with their favorite athletes.

Milledge also played 145 games for the Nationals.

I’m giving our loyal and friendly readers, which would be you, something to talk about on a day with no game.

I’m going to pathetically brag, in the hope that you will one up me or fill in my gaps, and we’ll have something to talk about until the next game.

Here goes:

• I’ve seen every team in NPB play at least one game, every season, since 2004.
• I’ve seen Tokyo play every team in the NPB, at least once a season, since 2006.
• I’ve seen Tokyo play in every stadium in Kanto (Jingu, Tokyo Dome, Yokohama, Chiba Marine, and Seibu Dome) at least once a season for each of the past three years.
• I’ve seen seen Tokyo play an away game against every other Central League team at least once.
• I’ve seen ten of the 12 NPB teams play regular season games at home.
• I’ve seen regular season games at 9 of the 13 regularly-used NPB stadia (I’ve seen games at the old Hiroshima Civic Stadium and have been to the badly-named Mazda Zoom Zoom Stadium Hiroshima, but not seen a game there.)
• I’ve seen Tokyo play at three irregular stadia (Kure, Matsuyama, and Sagamihara.)

In MLB:

• I’ve been to only four teams’ stadia: Cubs, Indians, Marlins, and Nationals (but I’ve been to both Cleveland Municipal and Jacobs Field.)
• I’ve seen the following MLB teams play regular season games: Cubs, Indians, Marlins, White Sox, Brewers, Yankees, Red Sox, Rockies, Nationals, Orioles, Pirates, Mets, Rays, Braves, Tigers, Angels, Giants, A’s, Mariners, Rangers, and Astros. I think that’s it.

CPBL:

• I once watched most of a Brother Elephants vs. Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions game on TV in a hotel room in Taipei while drinking Taiwan Beer. (Not impressive, I know.)

Top me. Beat me. (In a nice way.) Let’s go from here, sports fans. Enjoy the off-day.

A couple of teams have apparentlyalready shown interest in the hard throwing right-handed pitcher: the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Texas Rangers.

Interestingly, the Pirates just acquired Akinori Iwamura in a straight-up trade with Tampa Bay. Iwamura was traded man-for-man with Jesse Chavez, a decent relief pitcher. The Rays apparently felt that Iwamura, just coming off a season cut short by a knee injury, was going to be too expensive to hold onto for a utility player. The Pirates, meanwhile, desperately need a second baseman (Iwamura played third for the Tokyo Swallows), and a healthy Aki Iwamura can definitely plug that gap for them.

If Igarashi ends up signing with Pittsburgh, then it would be a reunion of sorts for the two former Tokyo players. It would also be the first time that two former Tokyo Swallows players have ended up on the same MLB team.