How Daisuke Matsuzaka affects Yu Darvish and a Rangers World Series

Zach Sommers
February 22, 2012

Last fall, the Texas Rangers twice found themselves one out away from their first World Series title in franchise history. Twice the St. Louis Cardinals denied them that celebratory experience, stealing Game 6 out from under them and eventually winning Game 7 in one of the most entertaining Fall Classic’s in recent memory.

If you lived anywhere outside of the 817, you’ll remember this World Series for those incredible comebacks, the national emergence of David Freese, the bullpen phone that didn’t work and the defining performance of one of the game’s greatest players. For those who call The Ballpark in Arlington home, however, it was the most bitter of pills to swallow; a reminder for the second year in a row that no matter how close you got, it will forever feel so far away.

How does a franchise spend an offseason after a finish like that? The Rangers went the route of a middle-aged, recent divorcee looking for that last taste of happiness: fancy, expensive foreign jewellery. And while Misty in Orange County may buy Cartier, the Rangers went east and bought the rare diamond known as Darvish.

Yu Darvish, a 25-year-old right-hander from Habinko, Japan, is the newest face of Major League Baseball’s Pan-Asian expansion. To say he was damn good in the Japanese league is a disservice to the term “damn good.” Darvish dominated in his six-year stint with the Nippon-Ham Fighters, twice winning Pacific League MVP and was generally regarded as the best pitcher in the country. 

[php snippet=1]

Obviously, interest in Darvish’s services grew in the United States, and after a successful 2011 season, Darvish announced his intentions to pitch in North America. The bidding commenced and in the end it was the Rangers who won with a reported $51.7 million dollar offer sheet. After lengthy negotiations, the team officially signed baseball’s new ambassador to a six-year, $60 million contract. It’s a lot of money for someone who’s never pitched a ball in the Major Leagues, but a necessary market price for someone of that reputation.

Marc Normandin is one of the senior writers for Over The Monster, a Red Sox-flavored blog in the SB Nation family. Normandin, along with the rest of those who follow the Red Sox for either personal or professional reasons, is able draw back on personal experiences when discussing the Darvish phenomenon. Boston’s pursuit of Daisuke Matsuzaka in the winter of 2006 is the closet comparable circus to what Texas did with Darvish.

“[It] seemed much quieter,” Normandin told the The Good Point. “Maybe there was more of an understanding time around that the negotiations were likely to go to the very end, as they had for Matsuzaka. The noise and coverage was heavy at the start and end of the process, but in between, in comparison, seemed light.”

Darvish’s expectations in Texas and what he will be able to produce as a starting pitcher will undoubtedly be two different things. What’s also different is what Texas fans want out of their newest star, and what they’ll ultimately accept regarding his career with the Rangers. For Matsuzaka, expectations were pretty high, and the first couple of seasons went as smooth as one could hope, especially in the baseball hotpot that is Boston. But injuries have derailed Matsuzaka’s MLB career over the past few years, and his performance has not been able to justify the large amount of money he gets paid over the course of the entire contract.

“Things work[ed] out well enough at first, especially since he helped them win a World Series in his first season with the team.” said Normandin. “But they haven’t had much in the way of consistent success with him, and I find it hard to believe that would be okay for Boston.”

But would that be okay for a team like Texas? Rangers history isn’t quite as glamorous as Boston’s; they don’t have a past littered with close calls and crushing defeats. They didn’t have 84 years of World Series heartbreak. The 2004 World Series win for the Red Sox raised expectations for Boston fans. One can assume that if the title of ’04 never happened, and Matsuzaka’s $100 million-combined price was the tipping point that brought them their first world title in what would have been 87 years at that point, Matsuzaka probably could have never pitched another game and Red Sox nation would be calling it the greatest signing in team history.

Will the same courtesies be given to Darvish? Texas doesn’t have 84 years of a championship drought to dwell back on, but that doesn’t mean the fan-base isn’t aching for a winner. From 1972 – when the Washington Senators moved to Texas – to 1995, the ball club never experienced postseason play. From 1996 to 2009, they played October baseball only three times, winning just one game.

Only recently has the team experienced deep postseason play, with two straight years ending the season as World Series losers. The obsession felt in Boston may not be the same in Texas, but there is certainly an urge to win now for Ranger fans.

Because everything is possible at this point, the Yu Darvish era in Texas can technically be a one-year, $100-million dollar investment with a World Series title coming back the other way. Would Ranger fans take the deal? Are there any who wouldn’t?

Even if Yu Darvish is paid like an elite pitcher for the next six years, does he have to pitch like one in order to avoid the “bust” label?

That’s the crux of this argument; what does Darvish have to do in order to be worth the price tag? There are hundreds of different scenarios that could define Darvish’s career, ranging from complete bust to Hall of Famer, but where the line between success and failure?

The Rangers’ pursuit of Yu Darvish wasn’t made in order keep the status quo in the Lone Star State. After two years of devastatingly close calls in the Fall Classic, anything less than a World Series ring may be considered a failure for the current Texas Rangers. If Darvish doesn’t deliver that particular package, history may look back on his career with tainted glasses. If he win three Cy Young’s in six years but brings home zero World Series titles, he may still not receive due praise.

Regardless whether any Texas fan likes the price tag still hanging off Darvish, the Rangers paid the price, and now there’s tremendous pressure to deliver on the deal.

[php snippet=1]

The Author:

Zach Sommers