Randy Bass - MLB Nobody... NPB Legend | NPB Player Profile
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- čas přidán 24. 08. 2023
- When NPB's greatest foreign players are brought up, there is one man who always dominates the discussion, Randy William Bass.
This is his story
My Twitter: / gaijinbaseball
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Data courtesy of:
Baseball Reference: www.baseball-reference.com/
NPBStatsdotcom: npbstats.com/eng/
Deltagraphs: 1point02.jp/ - Sport
Good dude. When I was 13, I got his autograph as a Padre. He was walking away from the dugout and I yelled "Hey, Randy 'star of the future' Bass!". He stopped and turned around. He then let out a big lumberjack laugh and gave me his autograph. I'm so glad I was right!!
2023 Bass was inducted into the Japanese Baseball Hall Of Fame. That same year, Hanshin wins their first Japan Series since Bass played. Curse of the Colonel reversed!
I met a former Tigers and Buffaloes player who owns a chanko restaurant in Osaka (his last name is Nakatani). He was super excited to tell me and my friend about playing with Randy Bass. Glad to finally get some background on why he was such a big deal.
That'd be Tadami Nakatani, who was Bass's teammate for a year, before getting traded to the Buffaloes mid-season in 1988.
From what I could find, they only played 7 games together, which I guess is a testament to Bass' impact if Nakatani still speaks that highly of him.
33:06
"Yappari boku wa gaijin datta." translated: "Of course it was because I am a foreigner."
The fact that the press put "gaijin" (a semi-slur for foreigner) in katakana to emphasize the word really shows how much people were on his side. Good on them. Good for Bass for saying it as well.
Bass in 81 really played in 69 games and had 4 HR and 20 RBI.
He also had 69 career mlb hits
@@ArrowheadAcre.5 nice
Nice
I saw one of his home runs in San Diego deep in the old San Diego stadium (a monstrous ballpark) 7/8ths up the right field bleachers nearly to the walkway.
Fantastic retrospective on the excellent career of Randy Bass. As much as I wonder about what he could've done in MLB if given the proper opportunity to develop, it just makes me appreciate the accomplishments he achieved in the Japanese game even more. It's just a shame that Hanshin's corporate management treated him like a cog in the machine that could be replaced on a dime. Thank you for the great videos, Gaijin Baseball. Can't wait to watch the next one.
This is the documentary I never knew I needed.
You are the man dude. Just stumbled upon this channel and I wish it nothing but a world of success. As a lifetime fellow die hard fan of baseball this research and content is very well appreciated 🙏
Just noticed that a Patron's name didn't show up in the final board, even though I mentioned him, sorry Eriq.
Also, the usual musical fadout I do was cut short by a copyright claim from Nippon Columbia, which is why I typically use the Tom O'Malley version of "Winds of Mt. Rokko", it's just the schpiel went on too long and I didn't want to expose y'all to the second chorus because well... it's hard to listen to.
Anyways, Thanks for all the support as always.
CORRECTIONS:
1. BASS was the 5th American MVP
2. OCHIAI WAS TRADED, NOT A FREE AGENT. This is massive mistake and that part of the video was too big to trim out. I'm a moron who didn't double check that and rolled with it.
It’s ok I forgive you
-Eriq
Great to see a all in one encompassing video on Randy Bass, ever since i recently got into npb after this wbc, i kept hearing about the mythical tales of Bass, but never saw anything on him. Thank you for making this video!
After more than 30 years searching for another Randy Bass, Tigers finally got him in the 2020 draft - Teruaki Sato. 😅
It went pretty well lol
I like that you put the Yakuza Game soundtrack in the background!
So strange seeing the Seibu stadium without the dome.
I salute you for nailing the pronunciation of so many Japanese names. But you might want to revisit Gene Mauch and Jack McKeon.
Yeah Gene Mauch was an honest mistake on my part, and Jack McKeon was because I'm Canadian, and I based my pronunciation off of Dave Keon.
Again, my bad
@@GaijinBaseball👍
What an awesome video, I've never teared up over sports before
All I can say is, its fortunate that Hanshin doesn't own a bathroom hardware store chain or a bathhouse chain otherwise they'd have to find a third way to spell his name.
What a great story keep it coming my guy.🎉
Great documentary on Bass. Thank you for sharing it.
Calling AAA nobodies "Minor League jobbers" is so goddamn funny, I'm giving you a sub just for that
Japan has a history of walking people that might break Oh’s records. Side note: I was watching the Mets play the Japanese All Stars in 1974 (or the Giants, I don’t remember which part of the tour this was), but it was bases loaded, Oh at the plate, score was 9-6 Mets, and the broadcast I was watching went to commercials - for about 15 minutes. I was in Okinawa and we had a maid who was watching with me while ironing, so I asked her what happened to the game? She said that the games had a 3 hour broadcast limit and in horror I watched a soap opera begin on TV. Turned out Oh hit a walk off grand slam.
Oh destroyed his own legacy by doing that. I wonder how legit his 868 mark is as you have to wonder how many times yakuza told pitchers to serve up meatballs for him to pad his numbers to catch Hank Aaron.
@@CGMedia2023
Right, it’s an odd culture in that pitchers were almost expected to not shame Oh. Oh and Hank Aaron had a home run contest in 74 as well, which Aaron won, by one in a comeback.
Great video man, very entertaining and educational. Keep grinding and putting out content like this and your channel will get big, I know it. The quality is too good for the algorithm not to recommend your stuff to people.
You absolutely hit it out of the park with this one.
Take all the time you need! Hope the long project will be a fulfilling and fruitful experience for you - excited to watch it!
Amazing video as usual I was so excited for this one!
Randy Bass isn't a legend. He's a GOD. Not an exaggeration, he's literally considered as a god-like figure among Hashin fans in Osaka.
Bassu Sama!!!
Quality work as usual
recently discovered your channel and have to say your videos are such helpful and well made resources for learning about NPB. im a new fan so i really appreciate the stuff you cover here!
Bass is why I'm a Tigers fan today.
Same here to an extent. The Curse is probably the main reason why I became a Hanshin fan, but Bass was such an important part of that he might as well be the main reason by proxy.
That and I love his story of how despite being gaijin, the Hanshin fan base chose to love him all the same. It’s like how certain gaijin pro-wrestlers (Bobo Brazil, Terry Funk, Stan Hansen) were equally well loved .
@@kaijudirector5336 fun fact: Bass and Hanson where friends.
I really enjoyed the video and I'm now subscribed. This is only the second one I've watched, but they're very good. The legend of Randy Bass in Japan is very cool.
I look forward to the rest of your videos. One criticism: You guys need to check your pronunciations of the older American players names before you record them. Aside from the ones you piinted out, you aslo mispronounced Vida and Mauch. That jumps out at someone who saw them for years. They're very well known guys, Vida being one of the best pitchers of the era.
Never knew he was that good of a prospect, shame the MLB cant seem to like him enough to give him games.
I think the MLB talent was just sky high from the late 60s-mid 80s, and wasn't easy to break in. Almost everyone had to be a well rounded player just look at the diversity of players and playing styles, not to mention our best athletes gravitated toward the game. Today, we are a pay to play baseball country and the moneyballers who run front offices rarely have interest in anything but meathead dingers or KO trying players. The Japanese league (if they kept their best) would be much much closer to MLB today (arguably better if it wasn't for the Dominicans). Maybe not in the 80s but Bass could have perhaps been a star in today's MLB.
Primary reason why Bass didn't get a shot is because MLB expanded 10 years too late. If the NL would have expanded to Denver and Miami in '83 instead of '93, we'd be talking about whether or not anyone would beat Bass's single-season home run record for the Denver Bears.
I have a gut feeling Ken Phelps would have been a super star in Japan.
Considering he was already a 133 OPS+ bat in MLB, yeah
Oh, man. Good call. Phelps' platoon issues might not have been so obvious in Japan.
Great story and great job telling it
Padre for life Randy Bass
2:40 Gene “Mouch.” Ouch 😣
I'm surprised they never retired his number
I agree with you there
But npb organisations are not as big into retiring numbers, i was told at one point in the case of many teams that with a change of ownership it's as though the history of the side has never existed
I get it, hanshin never changed ownership so they have more of a case to retire Bass' number
In other organisations, I'm sure nomura's number is worthy of retirement for softbank hawks even though he played under nankai ownership, harimoto for the fighters is surely worthy too but he played when they were toei flyers, I'm also sure kaneda is worthy of one for the swallows too and there are a few others
I'm always surprised at the lack of retired numbers
@@anthonypang7927 The Tigers are notorious for not retiring numbers. Kakefu, Okada aren’t retired numbers so Bass won’t be. In the case of Nomura he had a really bad relationship with the Hawks that only resumed right before his death. Also Kaneda is already a retired number with the Giants so that’s going to be highly unlikely
I love baseball.
Why they beat the shit outta the KFC manager? 😅
Because he was trying to stop them from taking the statue lol
Ah the stories i hear about fans of yesteryear!
They were a rougher kind it seems
People who get paid that little need to pick their battles
8:39 to be fair he was hitting Cleanup,if you can't hit Homers, you aren't a really good cleanup guy.
didn't the tigers win the japan series in 2023? after they inducted bass into the HOF? coincidence?
Where do you get the footage is their any full game footage
The highlight packs for games 1-6 of the 85 Japan Series can be found pretty easily if you search "1985年 日本シリーズ"
A lot of other footage game from short segments as well as these two docs
One covering notable foreign players for the 60s throught the 80s that sadly seems to have been taken down
One covering every player who hit over 400 homers before the mid-90s:
czcams.com/video/uK9Ae8OarYc/video.htmlsi=QnT28t2zBsNOnm_T
And I also use this doc on pre-1996 no-hitters a lot:
czcams.com/video/G_U7ygRWzNk/video.htmlsi=QLeiphJoIBas7gX0
I think Mr Baseball was based on him
Him and a few other players.
A bunch of foreign players from that era were consultants for that film, but I don't think Bass is one of them.
Tom Selleck is a dead ringer for Gary Rajsich
19385😂😂😂😂😂
What are you referring to? I scrolled through the video and I can't find what you're talking about?
I'm not familiar with the careers of most of the guys you mentioned near the end of the video. I grew up an Orioles fan so i watched Leo Gomez for several years, he was never very good in the MLB. You said these guys weren't given a fair shot in mlb but Leo played over 600 games in the MLB, that's more than a fair shot. Hell, he only ever played like 50 games more in NPB than he did in MLB.
Leo Gomez was a lot better than you think he was. He averaged 2.7 WAR/162 and was a league average bat.
He was a starting caliber MLBer when he got the playing time and was lured away by money. Not many guys in his circumstances still go over, the only one I can think of is Domingo Santana.
@GaijinBaseball ah, man. I had a sneaking suspicion you were "one of those baseball fans," and I'm very sad to see you are. I like your narration style and this was a good story, but if your only arguments are stats (ESPECIALLY WAR), you don't actually know baseball. You just know math. They truly aren't the same thing.