Japanese Baseball Cards: Shun Yamaguchi

Monday, April 3, 2023

Shun Yamaguchi

Former Baystars and Giants pitcher Shun Yamaguchi formally announced his retirement last week. Yamaguchi was Yokohama's first round pick in the high school portion of the 2005 draft out of Yanagigaura High School. He spent most of his time during his first couple seasons on the farm, working as a starter in 2006 and 2007 before converting to middle relief in 2008. He was up with the ichi-gun squad for good in 2009, starting the season in a setup role before taking over as closer midway through the season. He ended the season with 18 saves and would save 30, 34 and 22 games in each of the next three years. A poor season in 2013 cost him his closer role and he struggled in the first half of 2014 as well before the Baystars moved him back into the starting rotation. He turned his season around, going 8-5 and lowering his ERA to 2.90 by the end of the season after it had ballooned to 7.62 at the end of May. After a so-so season in 2015 he bounced back in 2016 with an 11-5 record with a 2.86 ERA. A shoulder injury sidelined him for the last month of the season though and he missed out on an opportunity to play in the postseason.

A free agent, he left the Baystars after that season and signed with the Yomuri Giants. The shoulder injury he'd suffered in 2016 was still bothering him the next season and he didn't make his first start with the top team until June. It was an auspicious debut, though, as he combined with Scott Mathieson and Arquimedes Caminero to no-hit the Hawks. It would be his only win of the season, however, as he injured his hand while getting drunk on his birthday at the end of July and had an incident at the hospital in which - while still drunk - damaged a door and assaulted a security guard. He would miss the remainder of the season between the injury and being suspended by the team.

He came back in 2018 to post a 9-9 record with an ERA of 3.68. The highlight of his season was his no-hitter (all by himself this time) against the Dragons on July 27th. He was pressed into service as closer towards the end of the season and notched his first save since 2013.

2019 would prove to be his best season as he would go 15-4 with a 2.91 ERA and 188 strikeouts for the Central League champion Giants. He got to pitch in the Nippon Series for the first and only time and then was a member of the Samurai Japan team that won the 2019 Premier 12.

He asked the Giants to post him after the 2019 season and, surprisingly, they did - it was surprising since the Giants had never posted a player before. Yamaguchi signed a two year contract with the Toronto Blue Jays but it did not go well - he went 2-4 with a 8.06 ERA in 17 games in the COVID-shortened season. The Jays released him just before spring training started in 2021 and he signed with the Giants - the San Francisco variety. He started the season with Triple-A Sacramento and went 0-3 with an ERA of 6.17 in five games (including four starts). San Francisco released him and he returned to Japan and Yomiuri in June. He went 2-8 with a 3.59 ERA in the remainder of the season. He suffered knee and calf injuries that sidelined him for much of 2022 - he only pitched two innings in one game with the ichi-gun team before being released at the end of the year. He attended the 12-team tryout but only drew interest from the Oita B-Rings of the independent Kyushi Asian League. With no NPB offers he decided to retire.

He was selected to the All Star team four times (2010, 2011, 2016 and 2019) although he declined the honor in 2016. He led the Central League in wins, winning percentage and strikeouts in 2019 along with winning the Best 9 award that season.

His first card was #68 from the 2006 BBM Rookie Edition set. His other rookie cards from 2006 are BBM 1st Version #320, BBM Baystars #YB02 and #YB79 and Calbee #261. TCDB.com's list of his cards can be found here. Here's some of his cards - I did a post for him back when he left for MLB that showed a bunch of his cards so I tried to mostly pick different ones: