Ichiro Traits For His Bats And Gloves

[hblakewolf]

Forum Readers-
I just picked up a nice unused Ichiro bat. while lloking for a photo of him with this bat, I found this interesting story about his equipment. I hope you enjoy it!

Howard Wolf
hblakewolf@patmedia.net


Monday, July 1

Ichiro's bats more than pieces of wood
By Jim Caple
ESPN.com

"Peanuts" cartoonist Charles Schulz felt so comfortable using a certain pen that when its manufacturer announced it was closing, he bought the company's remaining inventory to use the rest of his life. When world-renowned cellist Matt Haimovitz flies somewhere he buys an extra plane ticket and places his instrument in the seat next to him. The fictional Roy Hobbs carved Wonderboy from a tree split by lightning and carried the bat in a bassoon case.
And then there's Ichiro. He keeps his bats in a humidor.
Off Base Power Rankings 1. Mariners
Only return to Seattle more welcome than Edgar would be cup of coffee under $4 2. Yankees
Just be glad Joe doesn't appoint Supreme Court justices 3. Expos
Suddenly, even Youppi! looks good 4. Ronaldo
Best performance by one-name star since Zamfir released greatest hits 5. Dodgers
Playing so well fans now hanging around until sixth inning 6. Giants
Managing Kent and Bonds like having Pakistan and India in same dugout 7. Mets
Finally, we learn their problem -- they don't perform well on grass 8. Amtrak
Typical. They didn't even reach bankruptcy on schedule 9. Cleveland
Sign of the times. Chief Wahoo replaced by Mr. Yuk 10. WorldCom
Bad news: It's bankrupt. Good news: One less telephone solicitor calling per night


Two humidors, actually. He has a large metal case that holds 10 bats and is kept inside a locked room in the Mariners clubhouse and he has a smaller carrying case for road trips. Seriously. Both contain a chemical rod that keep the bats from losing or gaining moisture. He also has his bats shrink-wrapped for delivery to protect them from the elements. During games, Ichiro keeps his bat leaning upright at a special spot on the dugout bench and personally brings all his bats to his locker after games. He is so meticulous, when he returns to the dugout after an at-bat, he always wipes the dirt and grass stains off the bat.
God forbid if anyone accidentally spit tobacco juice on Ichiro's bat. It would be like leaving the Shroud of Turin in the rain.
"To become a better player, you have to take care of your equipment," Ichiro said through Mariners translator Hide Sueyoshi. "The same thing applies to a chef (and his knives). You're a professional. You earn money with a profession therefore you respect the tools you use to earn the money."
In other words, what Ichiro keeps in his humidors are even more precious than a case of Cohiba Esplendido cigars freshly smuggled out of Havana. You win eight consecutive batting titles and then tell him he's wrong.
Ichiro's bats are 33.5 inches long and weigh between 900 and 910 grams (about 32 ounces). They are jet black with his name on the barrel in stylish lettering. He says he's been using the same model bat ever since a trip to the Mizuno factory after his rookie season when he plucked it from the inventory as if he were King Arthur pulling Excalibur from the stone.
He uses separate bats for batting practice and games. The batting practice model is made from tamo wood. His game bat is made of ash.
"I used the tamo wood when I played in Japan," he said, "and when I came here I used both to compare them and I found that with this climate, the ash is more durable than the tamo."
Think about that for a moment. This is a man so studious about his profession that he takes the climate and humidity into account when he bats. Any more questions about how he led the league in batting average his first season here?
Ichiro, of course, isn't the only player who takes great care with his bats. Edgar Martinez carries a scale with him so he can weigh his bats to make sure that they haven't gained excess weight from the pine tar he layers on the handle. Just as I thought -- .00003 ounces heavy. Bring me the head of the Louisville Slugger rep! But longtime Seattle clubhouse manager Henry Genzale says he's never heard of anyone with a humidor except Ichiro. Neither has three-time batting champion Larry Walker, who pays so little attention to his bats that he might use bats from three different manufacturers in one game.
"I've never thought of sticking them in a humidor," Walker said. "I have a lot of superstitions, but none that involve my bat. I just grab what's there. Grip it and rip it."
It is not superstition though that prompts Ichiro to treat his equipment so carefully -- it is respect. His gloves are lovingly handmade for him each year by a 69-year-old Mizuno employee named Yoshii Tsubota and Ichiro regards them so reverently it's as if he knew the cows personally, oiling the leather as religiously as George Hamilton preparing for an afternoon at St. Tropez. He is so meticulous with his gear that when the Mariners ran the proposed design for this year's Ichiro bobblehead doll past him, he told them it needed elbow pads (either for authenticity or as a precaution in case it had to bat against the Randy Johnson bobblehead).
Of course, even the great ones lose their grip occasionally. Ichiro admits -- gasp! -- that he threw his bat during a game in 1995 and felt such regret that he brought it to his room that night to keep it with him. He cannot believe the way many major leaguers treat their bats -- flinging them in disgust, smashing them against a wall in frustration, snapping them in half and not storing them in a hermetically-sealed chamber under 24-hour escort.
"It's not only the bat. It's the gloves too," he said. "Some guys let their gloves dry out and don't take care of them. Sometimes they sit on their glove. Those are things I can't understand. I can't imagine."
You get the feeling his batting gloves are less for his hands than for his bat. The Smithsonian should be so lucky to have curators this meticulous.
"Think about it," Ichiro said. "Those bats and gloves are not machine-made -- they are hand-made. If someone who makes a glove or bat sees their product thrown away they will be very sad about it. They feel invested in it. Hopefully the players will think of the people who made the equipment."
The book, "The Natural," ends somewhat differently than the movie. In the book, Roy Hobbs breaks Wonderboy and there is no "Savoy Special" to replace it. He strikes out, the Knights lose and after the game he carries Wonderboy to left field where he digs a "rectangular slash into the turf" to bury the bat.

• He couldn't stand seeing it in two pieces so he removed them and tried squeezing them together in the hope they would stick but the split was smooth as if the bat had willed its own brokenness and the two parts would not stick together. Roy undid his shoelaces and wound one around the slender handle or the bat, and the other he tied around the hitting part of the wood, so that except for the knotted lace and the split he knew was there it looked like a whole bat. And this is the way he buried it, wishing it would take root and become a tree.

Ichiro saves his broken bats to give to friends, but he says he understands how Hobbs felt when he buried Wonderboy. "Equipment has heart, human heart, inside it," he said.

[worldchamps]

I need some assistance on Ichiro bats....not really sure how to telll if it is a bp (tamo wood) or game bat (ash)

Any advise or pointers to look for would be greatly appreciated.

Feel free to post or contact me directly

rangersstars@yahoo.com

[worldchamps]

I am needing assistance with an Ichrio bat. If anyone has any info they can offfer please contact me

Main question is

How do you tell a BP from a gamer?

rangersstars@yahoo.com

[Qstick333]

I'm thinking that a quick phone call to Mizuno to discuss would probably clear things up in a a matter of a few minutes..........

[hblakewolf]

I am needing assistance with an Ichrio bat. If anyone has any info they can offfer please contact me

Main question is

How do you tell a BP from a gamer?

rangersstars@yahoo.com

The difference is about $500.!!!

Howard Wolf
hblakewolf@patmedia.net

ALWAYS BUYING PHILLIES, PORTLAND BEAVERS AND PORTLAND MAVERICKS JERSEYS

[worldchamps]

I guess I didn't phrase my question correctly. It is not the value I am looking for. I have a game bat and I am curious if it is a game or batting practice bat. In the article it references a different type of wood used, tamo vs ash. I am unfamilar with how to tell the difference of the two?

rangersstars@yahoo.com

[indyred]

Could you post a picture of it?
Interesting article. How big would a portable humidor be. On a long road trip you would think he must bring 15-20 or so bats.

[hippo916]

Ichiro game bats have a "51 A" on the knob. The "A" signifies ash. Additionally, Ichiro game bats, as well as his BP bats, are triple-dipped in lacquer and the end of the knob shows no wood grain. If an Ichiro bat shows wood grain on the knob or is not triple-dipped on the end of the knob, it is merely one of many annual gift or charity bats that Ichiro has manufactured by Mizuno to honor the volumes of requests for his memorabilia.

Randy

[worldchamps]

Thank you, that helps out a lot. I guess mine is a BP tamo wood bat then. It does not have the A on it. It does have a brown 51, I guess it is brown bc that is the true color of the wood. The triple lacquer explains a lot, the bat is so shiny. It has some lace marks but not really any blue ink transfers from the balls.....is that due to the heavy lacquer?

I will post some pics on monday.

[CollectGU]

I'd say it doen't have ink tranfer marks because he wipes all his bats down...

Regards,
Dave