Posted by Michael Street on Wednesday, October 21, 2009 at 2:24 am

In July, I wrote that Kenji Johjima’s generous contract extension, expiring in 2011, would be the last of the bloated Bavasi Era deals that Seattle would get off its books.

Mariners fans won’t have to wait that long.

Johjima anounced today that he’d finish his pro career in Japan, giving up the last two years of his Mariners contract extension, worth $16M, so that he could be closer to his family.

Seattle has to be breathing a sigh of relief, albeit a bittersweet one. By all accounts, Johjima is a good clubhouse guy and a hard worker, a decent (but declining) hitter and adequate backstop. As I pointed out in that same July column, Johjima has value to Seattle—just not as much as that$24M extension gave him.

Where Johjima falls short of the mark is as a game-caller, possibly the most important part of a major-league catcher’s job. Almost without exception, as I broke down in that same column, the Seattle pitchers did worse with him behind the plate.

And that points to several hurdles, possibly insurmountable ones, that Johjima had to overcome when moving from NPB to MLB.

The first was all the new batters he had to learn. The entire NPB has twelve teams, while the AL alone has 14 (MLB has 28, of course, though he wouldn’t see the NL all that often). Catchers keep books of opposing hitters, something they only learn over time—Johjima entered the league with an empty book.

Next, of course, he had the language barrier. He had some familiarity with English, but not enough to have a real conversation with his pitcher on the mound during a game. In practice, he could use a translator, but the expression “lost in translation” is a cliche for a reason—not everything gets from one person to the other even in the best of circumstances.

Add to this the language and culture issues Johjima dealt with off the field; those were the same as those faced by Ichiro, Dice-K, Tazawa, or any other Asian imports, but it was just one more difficulty he faced.

The biggest obstacle may have been the difference in pitching strategy between the US and Japan. Major league pitchers depend on their fastballs much more than NPB pitchers and are also far more aggressive. NPB pitchers mind a walk much less, something that’s evident in Dice-K’s haphazard approach to the strike zone.

Trying to adjust his mindset to all these factors may have been too much for Johjima to handle. It’s also possible that his offensive decline in the U.S. was a continuation of his slide in NPB.

In 2003 with the Softbank Hawks, he hit .293/.348/.517, impressive numbers and career highs for him. He followed that up with a 2004 when he hit .338/.432/.655, also career highs, but then slipped back in 2005, his final year in NPB, when his numbers were .309/.381/.557.

Those are still nice numbers, but perhaps the decline we’ve seen here in the US is just a combination of all the factors above, added to the natural slide of a catcher entering his 30s (Johjima turned 30 in 2006).

Whatever the reasons for his inability to excel in the States as he had in Japan, the question for the Mariners now becomes, who will replace him?

Right now, they’ve got Rob Johnson, who’s capable enough defensively, and was Felix Hernandez’s personal caddy, helping him to a 15-2 record. But he hit just .213/.289/.326 this past season, even if he’s done better than that in the minors. In AAA in 2008, Johnson managed a decent .305/.363/.441, with a .61 batting eye—his third season in AAA.

Wak’s Way, as I mentioned in an earlier column, focuses on strong defenders who don’t necessarily hit well, so he might fit in to that plan. And the potential’s there for improvement, but it will be interesting to see if Seattle’s patient enough to give him three seasons for his lumber to match his leather.

Plus, Johnson’s undergoing two hip surgeries in the offseason, so he’ll be undergoing rehab in the offseason. It’s possible the abnormal bone growth they’re removing will help him perform better next season—or he might not be healthy enough to play well.

The other guy is Adam Moore,  a rookie this season, who has the offensive chops that Johnson lacks. But he’s still working on his defensive game, and both are important. He hit .301/.369/.483 in the minors, but spent a little over a half-season at AAA before being promoted.

That’s a fair amount to overcome for a rookie, and Moore could do it, but it will likely take a little time.

The ultimate bad timing of all this, however, was the trading of Jeff Clement late last season, for a package of prospects that brought them Jack Wilson and Ian Snell.

Clement, the former #3 pick of the 2005 draft—ahead of names like Ryan Braun, Troy Tulowitzki and Jay Bruce—had struggled offensively as a catcher,and in fact was being used primarily as a DH at AAA before being traded.

But he was traded in part because his way was blocked after Johjima’s signing; even as a DH, the aging Johjima could have blocked Clement, too.

And so he was traded, with the club assuming that the 2011 timeline would give Seattle enough time to groom Johjima’s replacement. Losing Johjima accelerates that timeline, but this should be viewed largely as a good thing.

The club gets its remaining $16M back, loses an aging, overpaid catcher, and gets to see some of the youth movement a bit sooner than expected.

The Asian sports community loses an important icon, but the consolation is that Johjima blazed a trail for other Asian catchers to follow. Currently, there are at least eight Asian-born catchers throughout the minor leagues and undoubtedly more on the way.

So Johjima made his mark on MLB—it just was neither as broad nor as deep as he’d hoped.