If we go by their NPBL (Nippon Professional Baseball League) stats, Yu Darvish and Masahiro Tanaka are the two best pitchers to leave Japan for Major League Baseball. Hideo Nomo, Hiroki Kuroda, Hisashi Iwakuma and Daisuke Matsuzaka were all very good but not in this category.
YU DARVISH
With a career ERA in Japan of 1.99 in 1268.1 IP over 7 years from ages 18-24 (2005-2011), Darvish sets a standard so high it seems unreachable. His last 5 years (2007-2011) he pitched all under 2.00 ERA and his last 3 years were even better compiling 1.64 ERA in 616 IP.
IP ERA H/9 HR/9 BB/9 K/9 K/W
2005-11 1268.1 1.99 6.5 0.40 2.40 8.9 3.70
2007-11 1024.1 1.72 6.1 0.34 1.94 9.5 4.90
2009-11 616.0 1.64 6.3 0.28 1.87 9.7 5.20
MASAHIRO TANAKA
Tanaka also pitched ages 18-24 in Japan over 7 years (2007-2013) with 47 more IP for a total of 1315 and a 2.30 ERA. However, his last 3 years he outpitched Darvish slightly and recorded the two lowest ERA'S of either pitcher in this time period with 1.27 in 2011 and 1.27 in 2013 going 24-0 in 2013. Darvish posted a 1.44 ERA in 2011, only second to Tanaka.
IP ERA H/9 HR/9 W/9 K/9 K/W
2007-13 1315 2.30 8.1 0.45 1.88 8.28 4.40
2011-13 611 1.44 7.3 0.27 1.15 8.70 7.56
Other comparison stats in their last 3 years:
W-L WHIP GS CG SHOT HR
Darvish 45-19 .913 76 28 10 19
Tanaka 53-9 .948 76 30 11 18
These performances almost mirror each other. They are very close. Is it possible that Tanaka might have squeaked by Darvish in his last 3 years in Japan?
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| Yu Darvish (Sports Illustrated.cnn.com) |
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| Masahiro Tanaka (Sportsgrid.com) |
Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference and NPBL.
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