Japanese Baseball Cards: RIP Isao Harimoto

Another Japanese baseball legend has died. Isao Harimoto, NPB's career hits leader with 3085, passed away on the Wednesday of last week at age 86.

Harimoto was born in Hiroshima to Korean parents who named him Jang Hoon. He severely burned his right hand after falling into a bonfire at age four and had only limited use of that hand. He and his family were still living in Hiroshima when the US dropped the first atomic bomb on the city on August 6, 1945. The family home was shielded from the blast itself by Hijiyama Hill which is probably why Harimoto survived. His oldest sister, Jang Jeom-ja, was not as fortunate. The 12 year old had been conscripted along with her classmates by the Imperial Japanese government to clear fire lanes in case of air raids. She suffered burns all over her body and succumbed to her injuries in the days following the bombing. Harimoto has been described as the only Hibakusha to ever play professional baseball but there were at least three others - Wataru Nonin, Takahashi Harada and Kunio Fukutomi.

His father returned to Korea after the war with the expectation that the family would join him once he got found stable employment but his father tragically died when a fish bone pierced his esophagus. After an illegal boat taking Koreans back to the peninsula capsized off the coast of Japan, his mother decided it would be safer for the family to remain in Japan.

The conditions in post-war Japan and the discrimination he and his family faced as Koreans shaped his childhood and, ultimately, his decision to play baseball. He started playing baseball in elementary school. He was naturally right handed, but the injuries he had suffered as a toddler to his right hand forced him to learn to throw left handed. He would climb trees outside of Hiroshima Sogo Ground Baseball Park, the home of the Carp before they moved to Hiroshima Municipal Stadium in 1957, and saw that the baseball players had access to much better food than his family did. He decided that baseball would be the way he could provide for them.

His other option, of course, was a life of crime. He got in a lot of fights and greatly admired the local yakuza. He had said that if he had stayed in Hiroshima, he thought he would have ended up joining them.

Luckily, he didn't stay in Hiroshima. With the help of his brother, he was able to attend Naniwa Commercial High School in Osaka. He had hoped to play in the Koshien Tournament and the team made it in 1958. However, several players, including Harimoto, were suspended from the team prior to the tournament due to a "violent incident in the clubhouse". Harimoto had always maintained his innocence and was convinced that he was included in the suspensions due to the coach's prejudice against Koreans.

He drew interest from professional clubs while in high school. The Yomiuri Giants suggested that he drop out of school in his second year in 1957 and join them as a pitcher. Harimoto had promised his brother that he'd graduate, so he declined the offer.

He was no longer a pitcher by the time he graduated but teams were still interested in him. While he had been interested in signing with the Carp, his final decision was between the Chunichi Dragons and Toei Flyers. Here, again, the poverty of his family played a role. Since they were too poor to have a television set, he and his brother (who was in charge of the negotiations) didn't know that the Central League was much more popular than the Pacific League. He ended up signing with Toei for a two million yen signing bonus. After the signing, he and his brother traveled back to Hiroshima from Tokyo on an overnight train with the entire two million wrapped in newspaper. When they presented it to their mother, her reaction was "Have you done something bad again?" Harimoto used the money to buy a new house for her.

He quickly established himself a star with Toei in 1959, winning the Pacific League Rookie Of The Year award. He hit over .300 for the first time in 1960 and won his first batting crown in 1961. He'd win a record seven batting titles during his time with the Flyers/Fighters (1961, 1967-70, 1972 and 1974) - Ichiro is the only other player who led the league in batting seven times. He also led the league in OBP nine times and hits three times. He won the PL MVP award in 1962, the year that Toei won their only pennant and Nippon Series championship.

Harimoto remained with the Flyers during their sale first to Nittaku in 1973 and then Nippon-Ham in 1974. He and the Fighters parted ways following the 1975 season with the 35 year old Harimoto being dealt to the Yomiuri Giants for Kazumi Takahashi and Masaru Tomita. At the time, the two teams shared Korakuen Stadium so his work commute didn't change.

The Giants were coming off their first ever last place finish under rookie manager Shigeo Nagashima and Harimoto would replace Nagashima as the number three hitter in the lineup, batting in front of Sadaharu Oh. The two would be dubbed the "OH Cannon" as an update of the "ON Cannon" that Nagashima and Oh had been called.

Harimoto's arrival also allowed the Giants to move Davey Johnson from third base to second, a position he was much more comfortable with while outfielder Shigeru Takada, displaced by Harimoto, took over third base. The move paid off for the Giants and they would win the Central League pennant in both 1976 and 1977, although they'd fall to the Hankyu Braves in the Series both years.

An eye injury limited him to just 77 games in 1979 and he hit only .263, his lowest batting average to date. The Giants felt the 39 year old was no longer in their plans and he transferred to the Lotte Orions for the 1980 season. That season would see him reach two career milestones - his 3000th hit on May 28th and his 500th home run four months later on September 28th. He is still the only player to reach 3000 hits in NPB. He returned for one last season in 1981 but hit a paltry .219 in 70 games and retired at the end of the season.

He won 16 Best 9 awards during his career and was named to the All Star team 18 times. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1990 and was selected as one of the outfielders (along with Ichiro and Hideki Matsui) on the 20th Century Best 9 team. He's the only player in NPB history with more than 500 home runs and 300 steals.

There were rumors of him being offered the managerial job with either Lotte or Nippon-Ham in the decade after he retired but nothing ever came of it. He is credited with being one of the three founders of the Korean Baseball Organization (KBO) which started up in 1982. He served as the special assistant to the commissioner of the league from its founding until 2005.

He was also a commentator on TV and was known for his "grumpy old man" opinions - Jim Allen described him as "the commander of Japanese baseball’s curmudgeon corps" in his BlueSky post about his passing.

He made some playing appearances in his 60's for the Tokyo Dreams of the Masters League, a baseball league for retired players that operated in the off season from 2001 to 2009. He managed to get a hit in 2005 although he said that the pitcher he got the hit off of, Nobuyuki Hoshino, was "going easy on him". Harimoto was also active in the annual Premium Malts old-timer game for a number of years.

There are a LOT of baseball cards for Harimoto. His earliest appearances were on menko and bromide cards in the early 60's and he was in the 1967 Kabaya-Leaf set. In the 70's he made regular appearances in sets from Calbee, Yamakatsu, Nippon-Ham and NST. He's shown up fairly regularly in OB sets from both BBM and Epoch (among others) since 2000. He also appeared in all three of BBM's sets for the Premium Malts old timer games in 2009, 2010 and 2012 (I've never been able to track down any Masters League cards or even really confirm if any existed) and had a "Ceremonial First Pitch" card in the 2016 BBM Fusion set. Here's a big batch of his cards: