Carol Hirata is a Dodgers fan, sure. But she tracks Japanese players in particular.
Hirata was only 7 years old when the San Francisco Giants signed Masanori Murakami in 1964, making him the first Japanese baseball player to reach the major leagues. She got a picture with him. And ever since, the Japanese players have especially caught her eye.
Now, as the Dodgers open the 2024 season with both highest-paid-ever player Shohei Ohtani and phenom pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto on the roster, Japanese American fans in LA’s South Bay like Carol Hirata have a little something extra to cheer for.
“When they made the announcement that they got Shohei, I couldn’t stop smiling,” Hirata says. “I was so happy.”
Gardena resident Randall Fujimoto put it this way: “I think anytime you see an Asian player, or somebody that looks like you, whether that be on a baseball field, or movie, or TV show, or somewhere, that other people see and appreciate, you feel a little bit of pride in that, and you feel a little more accepted as an American.”
It’s also a big deal to the kids in the Sansei Baseball League, which is based in Torrance and serves South Bay players, many of them Japanese American. League parent Shozo Yoshikawa of Torrance observed that now every team has a number 17 jersey – Ohtani’s number as a player for both the Angels and the Dodgers.
Yoshikawa, who roots for the Angels, actually wasn’t too sad to see the star player move up north.
“If he were to go anywhere, then I wanted him to go to the Dodgers,” Yoshikawa says, “because then I knew he would have the best shot of consistently being in the playoffs and still be close enough that my son and I would be able to watch his games.”