This was sent to me by a guy from the Seattle forums/blogs called
"Tokyo Sam", and it is a very good translation of the Number article 
which everyone's getting all riled up about.

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Let me preface this translation by saying the article doesn't mention
any of the circumstances surrounding the interview -- if it is such --
no date, no location (other than Seattle), etc. Therefore, I'm not
really sure whether it was a face-to-face interview, a set of written
responses on paper or what. It is implied that the author interviewed
Ichiro because the blurb at the beginning of the piece says, "...so I
asked Ichiro during his off-season in Seattle," but there is room for
doubt.

I put this down because I'm sure you good people are smart enough to
figure out that the circumstances certainly do matter. And as I've
mentioned elsewhere, 75 percent of the article is guesswork and
conjecture on the part of the author. IOW, he seems to be reading a lot
into Ichiro's comments (especially if the direct quotes are all that
came from the interview) and it seems to me that it is more what the
author wrote that is raising a fuss in the U.S.

Also, it should be noted that the article starts on page 100 of a 124
page magazine; i.e., it was buried pretty far in back. Of course, since
most of the magazine was devoted to the Japanese baseball playoffs
that's understandable, but the article also comes after an interview
with a Japanese pitcher, an article on the MLB postseason, and an
article on Hideki Matsui. Frankly, it was the last real article in the
magazine. If the editors thought the contents were such a big deal,
wouldn't they have put it in a more prominent location?

Finally, since the article is not in the regular interview format, I'll
put down a summary (as "background info") of what the author wrote that
leads up to the quotation, and then I'll translate the quotation.

Background info: The date was October 2, 2005. The last game of the
season. Despite the M's 69-92 losing record and the fact that they were
playing another team that didn't make the playoffs, there were 35,300
fans in the stands. Ichiro was busily preparing for the game as he does
with all day games.

Not all the other players were preparing in the same way, however. Even
though many of the players had just been called up from the minors, as
soon as September came around some were counting the number of days to
the offseason. There were some players who were devoting all their time
to playing cards in the clubhouse. And just before the last game of the
season, many players were busily preparing to leave for the offseason.
Most of the players no longer had any personal goals and were just going
through the motions.

Ichiro: "I wonder if there were any other players who thought about the
meaning of that game? There were many things in that game that you
couldn't have felt on opening day."

"I think that game is where we, as players, should have shown our worth.
I think it is where a player really shows how he feels about baseball. I
think it was a day in which everything you feel about baseball is
condensed into a single day: What you are aiming for as a player; how
you feel about baseball; how you feel about the fans; and the kind of
pride you have. However, I didn't feel that from any of the players and
I didn't see the manager or any of the coaches looking for that kind of
atmosphere. The game just went along as if it were another day at the
office. I really don't want to talk about stuff like this. But I feel I
have to give a frank answer if I'm asked because there were fans who had
paid money to watch a last-place team play. That's why I wanted to play
as well as I could, and why I'm disappointed that I wasn't able to live
up to the fans' expectations."

Background info: The Mariners ended the season last in the AL West with
a 69-93 record. Ichiro had 206 hits in 679 ABs, 15 HR, 68 RBI, 33
steals, and scored 111 runs. His .303 BA was eleventh in the AL.

Ichiro: "What? There were only ten players with better batting averages?
It felt to me as if there were twenty. How many players had 200 or more
hits? Three? If Jeter had 202, then I guess that makes me second. I
guess that fact gives me some satisfaction. It goes without saying that
it wasn't a fun season and that it was really tough. I have never
thought, 'Why can't I get a hit?' so often, and there was no feeling of
getting hits in bunches. Personally, I felt it was the worst season
ever. Still, when I come up second in the number of hits when compared
with others, I guess that doesn't feel too bad."

Background info: During spring training, Ichiro noticed a problem with
his swing. His upper body was going into motion a little quicker than
his lower body. He started to make adjustments on June 8 and he thought
his adjustments were over by July 4. In that game against the Royals, he
thought, "I'm all right now."

Ichiro: "When I realized that my lower body wasn't starting as quickly,
I felt that this would make playing baseball easier. I sometimes feel
that I have nothing left to discover technique-wise. For now, I don't
see anything I have to learn and I'm not searching for anything. This
could mean that this is the end technique-wise, but it might not be.
However, this year really brought home the fact that batting isn't just
about technique. You can't keep getting hits a whole season just with
technique. My batting 'balance' was disrupted by factors other than
technique. Things were really crazy. My mental state was upset and my
body, too. I really felt how mental disruptions can cause physical
problems."

Background info: The author is guessing that the "mental disruptions"
that Ichiro mentions is the fact that Ichiro was never on the same page
as the manager with regard to the kind of baseball the M's were going to
play. One of the reasons he cites is that Hargrove said something like,
"When things are tough, play for the team," during a team meeting, but
Ichiro doesn't buy into this kind of thinking.

Ichiro: "I think winning teams put players before the team. They let the
players show off their talent and play their roles; the result being
that the players are playing as a team. Losing teams don't do that.
Losing teams aren't able to harness their players' talent so they can't
win. They say things like 'play for the team' as an excuse for not being
able to get the most out of their players, but that just leads to more
losses. It's really a vicious cycle."

Background info: The author presents a number of anecdotes about
Ichiro's relations with his managers, but the conclusion is that Ichiro
was never able to figure out what Hargrove was thinking.

The author then goes on to lay the background for the most telling story
from the August 8 game against the Twins. This is the game in which the
M's were facing Carlos Silva and Hargrove supposedly told the players to
lay off the first pitch and make Silva throw more pitches. It seems that
when Hargrove told the team this, Ichiro was in the clubhouse changing
undershirts. Not knowing the manager's wishes, Ichiro swung at the first
pitch in his next at bat and flied out to right. Hargrove immediately
called Ichiro over to reprimand him.

Ichiro: "I guess he didn't like the fact that a few players, including
myself, were swinging at the first pitch and making outs. But if you
don't swing at the first pitch, you're just making the pitcher throw a
few more pitches. When you have a pitcher who throws that many strikes
you might break his rhythm by hitting early, but I don't think you can
do that by just watching strikes go by. Telling batters to watch strikes
because they're making outs swinging at first pitch strikes is too
passive. You just find yourself in a hole and it makes the pitcher feel
better. If the pitcher is throwing strikes early, you have to swing
early. That makes both sides start to think. I think that would be a
more aggressive approach. In addition, with the way I bat, I might swing
at a pitch that is way out of the strike zone. However, that's because I
feel that that pitch is in my hitting zone and that's the way I play."

Background info: The author writes that this incident figuratively tied
Ichiro's hands. He says that Ichiro felt that Hargrove didn't want his
players to swing at first pitch strikes, so that made it difficult for
him to go after those pitches. This led to doubt in Ichiro's approach
and the author uses the following stats on first pitch batting average
as evidence.

2001 42 for 95, .442
2002 39 for 93, .419
2003 39 for 102, .382
2004 52 for 114, .456
2005 13 for 65, .200

Ichiro: "The team environment is very important to be able to enjoy
playing baseball. Depending on the environment, players may show more
will power than they ever have or they might put up unheard of numbers.
I've always felt that it is very difficult to try to keep motivating
yourself, and this season was proof of how difficult that is to do. I
think that this might have been the most difficult challenge that I've
ever faced. It was also a season in which I discovered my limitations."

"Of course I want to win, too. But the important thing is not to lose
your motivation because you're losing. Whether you can question why the
fans keep coming even though we've lost so many games will depend on the
player. But the fans aren't coming just to watch the final out of a win.
They come because they want to see players do things that they can't.
That's why, whether you've had a winning season or a losing season, you
have to keep preparing and show the fans your best. I want the Mariners
to be a team that can do this most natural of things as if it came
naturally. I think that fans will accept that kind of team whether it's
winning or losing."

Background info: The author says that although Ichiro wants to stay in
Seattle, he may be facing the most difficult time of his career. The
reason is that he's feeling more responsibility than he ever had before.

Ichiro: "I want a comfortable level of stimulation. That's something
that I'm always looking for. But I guess I have to become the type of
player who can provide that kind of stimulation."

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