Eri Yoshida, the teenaged Japanese female knuckleballer, will pitch in Arizona in January. I should send my daughter (who is learning Japanese) to interview her. We hosted a Japanese exchange student with that first name, and I believe the pronunciation is closer to Eddie.
Best of luck to Ms. Yoshida in her US ventures.
Correction: Fixed the link.
That link keeps taking me back to Adrian Gonzalez trade rumors.z
What would you say are the odds of her landing a minor league deal with ANY team at ANY point?
@Jesse R: Not good. She needs to show she can get batters out with the knuckle ball. I could see an independent league team giving her a job at some point. She should look up Tim Wakefield while she’s in the states and get some pointers.
It seems to me that a knuckle ball is probably the path of least resistance into professional baseball for a woman. Eri might not be the one to break the barrier, but she might encourage others.
That’s what I figured, but then again, there’s always Pittsburgh– they could sign her for the league minimum and gain some publicity from what would obviously amount to a stunt.
Without meaning to sound sexist, I regretfully agree that a knuckleballer would probably be the first female in the ML. I’d have to assume right off the bat that C, 1B, 3B, and RF (typically power positions) would be hard, but maybe a VERY FAST female CF or slick-fielding 2B… but you’re right, pitching would be easiest, knuckling even easier.
Wow, they have the same sort pronunciation issues in Canada!
Geddy Lee was born Gary Lee Weinrib on July 29, 1953 in Willowdale, Toronto.[1] Lee’s stage name, Geddy, was inspired by his mother’s heavily-accented pronunciation of his given first name, Gary, and it later became his highschool nickname before he adopted it as his stage name.
🙂
And if you read the whole entry, there’s a fascinating bit of baseball trivia.
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