Astros Pitcher Tatsuya Imai Hasn't Taken to MLB Right Away. Is Some of It the Team He Chose?

Kazuma Okamoto, the Blue Jays third baseman, feels at home in Toronto. He is enjoying trying new foods. His favorites so far are sandwiches and quesadillas.

In Chicago, Munetaka Murakami is hitting home runs at a rate no Japanese-born player ever has to begin an MLB career. As he rounds the bases, his third-base coach celebrates by sheathing an imaginary samurai sword. The White Sox have fallen for Murakami, and he loves them back.

Then there is the case of Houston Astros pitcher Tatsuya Imai.

Like Okamoto and Murakami, Imai signed with a major league club over the winter after establishing himself in Japan’s top league, Nippon Professional Baseball. Unlike them, he is not having a great time.

Imai made headlines last month for acknowledging that he was struggling to acclimate to the United States. “He’s not able to adjust to the American lifestyle,” his interpreter, Shio Enomoto, said. “Baseball and outside of baseball.”

Six decades after Masanori Murakami became the first Japanese-born player in the majors, there are 18 Japanese- and South Korean-born players on 40-man MLB rosters. Most were seasoned veterans overseas before becoming “rookies” again, adapting to a new league, language and life in North America.

Interest in the Japanese baseball market intensified in the past decade with the high-profile arrivals of Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki, all of whom are with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

With the spike in interest has come an increase in the parties involved in the transition -- Japanese management companies, agents, trainers, sponsors, clubs on two continents and MLB team owners pressuring their operations departments to add a Pacific Rim star. All of this can further complicate a career move.

Over the years, some MLB clubs have learned a lot about trying to ease the transition, with teams including the Dodgers, Mariners, Cubs, Yankees and Red Sox becoming known and trusted as destinations. But others, like the Astros, have had far less experience with it.

Imai is the first Japanese player Houston has signed directly from Nippon Professional Baseball.

“If you haven’t had a good experience with a Japanese player already, you’re way behind,” said an MLB agent, who was granted anonymity to speak with candor. “If you’ve had a bad experience with a Japanese player -- that could be just as simple as the player didn’t play well, and you traded him or released him; or the player was with your team and spoke badly about you to other players -- word of mouth is everything in Japan.”

This winter, Munetaka Murakami toured the White Sox facilities on Chicago’s South Side and noted the home clubhouse had no bidets. The White Sox, a club attempting to revive its Pacific Rim scouting efforts, had crafted a thorough recruiting pitch for Murakami. But they had not considered bidets.

“Well,” General Manager Chris Getz recalled thinking, “that seems like something we can do, right?”

Installing bidets was a gesture that served to show Murakami the White Sox would go the extra mile to make him comfortable. From the outset, they told him and his representatives they wanted honest feedback.

“We’re not going to have this perfect out of the gate,” Getz said. “But there is an intention and willingness to continue to improve what needs to be improved.”

The club’s attention to detail has paid dividends, as his total of 15 home runs through Saturday’s games was tied for the MLB lead. It could prove even more valuable in future free-agent pursuits if the White Sox burnish a reputation among Japanese players as a good landing spot. “When you’re in this world,” the agent said, “Japan is a small town. People know what goes on.”

A quarter-century ago, MLB clubs onboarding Asian players were reliant on players largely figuring things out on their own. Over time, certain teams have seen what works (and doesn’t) and have built support structures: in some cases, hiring Japanese and Korean speakers for the training staff or allowing players the autonomy to bring along a personal trainer or interpreter with whom they are close.

In recent years, as some front offices realized how far they were behind the Dodgers and other teams with prolonged investment in Pacific Rim scouting, they have asked agents for intel about how they can catch up. The advice they receive is often simple: Make an effort to understand the player culturally, and show a willingness to be flexible and tolerant.

The San Diego Padres are one of the clubs ahead of the curve. Their director of Pacific Rim operations, Acey Kohrogi, once helped bring Japanese ace Hideo Nomo and South Korean starter Chan Ho Park to the Dodgers. Padres General Manager A.J. Preller memorized several minutes of Japanese in an effort to woo Ohtani in 2017. The idea is to foster an organizational culture that supports each player to allow him to focus fully on baseball.

That means remembering how difficult small tasks, such as checking into a hotel or navigating an airport, can be in a foreign language.

Alan Nero, an agent who leads Octagon’s baseball division, said most Asian players transition remarkably well to major league life, and the process has become streamlined as more players make the move. Agencies shoulder a large share of the responsibility for making a recent arrival comfortable. They might host dinners with teammates or ask other clients to help the new guy integrate into the clubhouse social scene.

Nero offered Chicago Cubs starter Shota Imanaga as an example. He has an interpreter, a Japanese teammate (Seiya Suzuki) and several Japanese speakers nearby at Octagon’s Chicago office.

“There’s a lot of support,” Nero said.

These days, many players from Japanese baseball sign with a Japanese management company that supports them in their daily life, and, if a player plans to become an MLB free agent, quietly helps him find an agent. Some players continue to work with that management company after arriving in the United States, which can ease the stress of settling into their living situation. But not all continue that relationship. Scott Boras, who represents Imai, said he had his own management company in Japan, employing four people there.

When Japanese pitcher Masao Kida pitched for the Detroit Tigers in 1999 and 2000, none of that ecosystem was in place. And while he had a difficult time getting outs in the majors, he had a good time. Living in a hotel room in Novi, a Detroit suburb where a Kida fan club sprouted, he frequented Japanese restaurants, sushi bars and grocery stores. He went to dinner at the Japanese consulate. He hosted sumo wrestlers. When he was released early in his second season in Detroit, teammates said they would miss the beloved prankster.

“You look back and know there were things we could have done better,” said Randy Smith, the club’s general manager at the time. “I just don’t know exactly what that would have been. It was so new for everybody.”

Smith now scouts for the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters. The club’s general manager? Kida.

Hard times are harder when you cannot communicate clearly. Just ask Imai.

Los Angeles Angels pitcher Yusei Kikuchi was a teammate of Imai’s in Japanese baseball. His experience in Houston fueled Imai’s interest in the Astros. Kikuchi watched the Imai interview, the one in which Imai spoke about not acclimating to the United States, the one that made waves. Kikuchi said through an interpreter that he felt something might have been “lost in translation.” Boras said he heard the same thing from Japanese speakers who said, “That’s really not what he was saying.”

Whether or not Imai intended to deliver such a blunt assessment of his transition to the United States as he hit the injured list with arm fatigue, the quote rapidly gained attention. Scouts whispered about his makeup. Fans called into question his readiness to pitch in the majors. Agents wondered whether the Astros shared those concerns yet felt pressured to sign a Japanese player -- their stadium’s naming rights are owned by the Japanese HVAC company Daikin.

That Astros team owner Jim Crane introduced a Daikin executive during Imai’s news conference in January accentuated how the partnership played a role in the player’s arrival.

Kikuchi had delivered a positive review of his time in Houston, yet he was a six-year MLB veteran when he was traded there in 2024, not a rookie still grappling with some of the issues cited by Imai: slick baseballs, warm weather, changing game day and travel routines.

Kikuchi attributed his own, smooth acclimation to Seattle with the Mariners in 2019 to the fact that he had wanted to live in the United States since high school. He trained there in the offseason. He did not seek out Japanese food. He did not want to recreate Japanese life in America. He wanted to experience something new.

When in Rome, “do as the Romans do,” Kikuchi said. “I had that mindset coming in.”

If anyone in the Astros’ clubhouse can relate to Imai’s quandary, it might be pitcher Peter Lambert, who was pressed into service after Imai’s injury.

Lambert spent last season with the Yakult Swallows, which made him appreciate the challenge of crossing the globe and changing leagues. In Japan, the baseballs, mounds and stadiums have a different feel. Travel is less taxing. Postgame meals are eaten at the hotel, not in the clubhouse. Starting pitchers have more rest between starts, and on days they are not pitching, they head home after pregame workouts. There is a lot more downtime, a lot less dugout time. “So many things are different between MLB and NPB,” Lambert said. “But I think one of the things that baseball across the world teaches all of the players is that you have to adjust quickly.”

Because foreign-born players are integral to the leagues in Japan and South Korea, they have learned what works over time. David MacKinnon, an American infielder who played in MLB, NPB and the Korean Baseball Organization, said Japanese clubs bring in so many foreigners each season that they have the process down pat. They provide an apartment. They send an interpreter to teach players how to use the train. They pick up family at the airport. They introduce Japanese culture with fun facts and info sheets.

“I think it’s a lot easier for foreign players to go to Japan than it is for Japanese players to come to the U.S.,” MacKinnon said.

In Houston, the Astros have made efforts to welcome Imai. In spring training, they shared a Japanese word of the day. Ryan Weiss, who pitched the past two seasons in the South Korean league, organized a dinner for him. Manager Joe Espada consulted managers who had worked with Japanese players.

Initially, Imai was eager to fly solo. In an interview last fall with Daisuke Matsuzaka, Imai said he would enjoy playing with Ohtani, Yamamoto and Sasaki in Los Angeles, but “winning against a team like that and becoming a world champion would be the most valuable thing in my life. If anything, I’d rather take them down.”

Now, he would settle for just finding his footing.

Imai, who went on the injured list April 12, has had two ominous rehab starts since then (as of May 9), one at Double-A Corpus Christi and one at Triple-A Sugar Land. Across the two starts, he issued eight walks in five total innings and threw 47.5% of his pitches for strikes. (He had a 54.2% strike rate and walked 11 batters in 8 2/3 innings during his first three major league starts.)

Despite those results, he was expected to return to the Astros’ rotation in a series against the Mariners. His healthy return is vital to the Astros’ odds of salvaging this season. It could also be pivotal for the organization’s reputation in the Pacific Rim.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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