Ka Leo O Hawaii

Issue date: 12/6/07 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Courtesy of Dave Rolf Sunset, created by vog from the Big Island, during the 2006 Hawai‘i Winter Baseball season at the Hans L'Orange Field in Waipahu.

Baseball may be the all-American sport, but for young players from Japan, it is an opportunity to come to Hawai‘i and expand cultural boundaries while playing the game.

This year, approximately a quarter of the players on the four Hawai‘i Winter Baseball league teams are from Japan. The cross-cultural partnership between Japan and America is unique to the league. Even though not all of the players speak each other's language, there are translators for each team, and it makes picking up a different culture necessary to work together.

"In terms of baseball, they get to see a different style of play," said Kyle Galdeira, sports information director of Hawai‘i Winter Baseball. "They get to interact and learn each other's language and culture using the game."

For many of the young men, most of them in their early 20s, even their game has changed slightly from exposure to the American teams. Fuminori Yokogawa, the 23-year-old right fielder for the Sharks, said that playing in Hawai‘i has made him think differently about the game and his technique.

"I realized I can't hit a ball with just power," Yokogawa said. "My baseball style and what I've done here are quite different."

The Hawai‘i Winter Baseball league started up in 1993. The history of baseball in the islands, though, stretches back to 1849, when the founder of organized baseball, Alexander Joy Cartwright, moved to the islands and his game caught on like wildfire.

In 1993, after a five-year break, Hawai‘i Winter Baseball owner Duane Kurisu invested in getting the game back in front of its fans and started up an international baseball league with teams composed of young people from 16 American major league teams, three Japanese pro teams and four Korean pro teams. It was Kurisu's dream, he wrote in the 1993 inaugural season yearbook, that one day there would be a true professional international World Series.

In the 1995 season, the league organized a home-stay program, where players stayed with a family in Hawai‘i, much like a foreign exchange program. Players pay their host families about $500 a month for the two months they stay, and in return, have access to food, laundry facilities and other amenities.

The families that volunteer to host players are screened to make sure they can provide a comfortable, friendly and safe environment for their guests, and often the relationships forged between a player and a host family last far beyond the baseball season.

"Most of the players end up keeping in touch with the host families as they move up," Galdeira said. "Some of the guys that are now in the majors still keep in touch with their hosts."

Hawai‘i Winter Baseball is a good place to get noticed by scouts from the Major Leagues. As a world-class event, Hawai‘i Winter Baseball provides representatives from Major League teams, like the Orioles and the Red Sox, a chance to catch a young player with incredible promise or to research play styles and techniques.

In addition, Hawai‘i Winter Baseball has formed an American/Asian business network that has proven to be highly successful and enables companies from both sides to reach a large international audience with their products. The games are broadcast in the U.S. and Asia, reaching an estimated 75 million people.

"It's gained quite a bit of appreciation around the country," said Dave Rolf, the publicist for the league. "There's a small but growing fan base in Major League Baseball."

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