Posted by Michael Street on Monday, January 18, 2010 at 11:14 pm

In honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday, I want to take a look at a different racial pioneer, and the best book out there about him. Wally Yonamine was actually a pioneer in two countries, in America and Japan, although I’d bet my eyeteeth very few readers (even the infinitely more knowledgeable ones here at BDD) have ever heard of him.

Wally Yonamine was the first NFL player of Asian descent and the first American player in postwar Japanese baseball. His tough-edged flair for the game changed how Japanese players approached the game, while his smiling nature smoothed over racial divisions, earning him the nickname “The Jackie Robinson of Japanese Baseball.”

Wanna know more? You can pick up the book, Wally Yonamine: The Man Who Changed Japanese Baseball, by Robert K. Fitts, for yourself. It’s a marvelous piece of baseball history writing, authored by the 2005 Sporting News-SABR-award winner Fitts.

Extensively researched, well-written, and endlessly informative and fascinating, this book makes an excellent addition to anyone’s baseball library and is absolutely required reading for anyone interested in Japanese-American baseball relations.

Yonamine was born in Olowalu, Maui, in 1925 to an Okinawan father and Japanese mother. Native Japanese looked down on Okinawans as country bumpkins and not “real” Japanese, splitting Yonamine among three worlds: Hawaiian/American, Japanese and Okinawan. But this cultural flexibility, as well as the thick skin he developed, would later be a tremendous asset.

Yonamine was a star high-school halfback, back when football was less specialized, so he played offense and defense, and could run, pass, kick, and return kicks. This talent would lead to a $14,000 contract from the San Francisco 49ers in 1947, right out of high school.

A brand-new NFL team, the 49ers recognized Yonamine’s talent as well as his appeal to Asian-American fans in the community. But he played little his rookie season, often seeming intimidated by the big crowds (and racist catcalls) and never found a starting spot.

In the offseason, Yonamine kept in shape playing semi-pro baseball in Hawaii, where his speed, athleticism and hustle made up for his raw skills. His Japanese-American team emphasized the small-ball tactics that would allow them to succeed against their bigger, stronger rivals.

Yonamine learned all he could; these techniques and the exposure he had with the team would change the face of sports on two continents. Fate helped a bit, too, when Yonamine broke his hand, voiding the second year of his 49ers’ contract and beginning the end of his football career.

He played semipro football and baseball and tried out for San Francisco in 1949. Despite his improved skills, he failed to make the team, and returned to semipro football and baseball. But he dislocated his throwing shoulder in a football game, and he couldn’t throw a pass (or a baseball) as far as he once could.

With football now no longer an option, Yonamine focused entirely on baseball, but that lame shoulder would hold him back from advancing beyond the minors. A good hitter with excellent speed and basepath instincts, he couldn’t hit for power and couldn’t throw hard, and a three-tool player won’t make the majors.

But Yonamine soon caught on with a different major league. The Yomiuri Giants of Japanese baseball wanted to return to their prewar winning ways and contemplated signing an American player. This presented significant problems, however.

Some foreigners had played in Japan before World War II, but no American had played since. Japan, always an insular country, hadn’t fully recovered from the war, and Americans weren’t terribly welcome. Conversely, an American player might experience homesickness and cultural adjustments that would make the relationship difficult in both directions.

The Giants heard about Yonamine from a local storeowner, and he seemed the perfect match: he had Japanese ancestry, spoke Japanese, and knew Japanese culture. Even better, he was a talented player who wanted to play pro sports at the highest level possible, and the Giants wanted to improve their team, so he signed early in the 1951 season.

He would make an impact from his very first game, revolutionizing the game in Japan. When Yonamine arrived, Japanese baseball strategy was executed mechanically, from sac bunts to breaking up double plays. Because their out was considered a given, players would lay down sacrifice bunts and then jog to first. Similarly, on a double-play ball, the player on first base would run out of the basepath as soon as the out was recorded at second.

Yonamine had learned the small-ball techniques and merciless American game, however, and didn’t have any of these preconceptions. On his first sac bunt, he sped down the line, surprising the third baseman so much that he didn’t even throw. The opposing players were shocked, but the Yomiuri fans loved it. When Yonamine broke up a double play, the crowd again went wild, while the opposition grumbled at what they saw as rough play. But soon every Japanese player was adopting these Western hustling techniques.

His influence extended off the field, too. Baseball teams had a typically Japanese rigid hierarchy, where  veterans were considered more valuable than rookies. They were always the first on and off the bus, at meals, or in the communal tubs—rookies always waited for the veterans, even if it meant cleaning up in cold, dirty water. Yonamine was a rookie but he was also quickly a starter and a star; he was also ignorant of the hierarchy. When he flaunted the rules, the tradition soon broke down, eventually making its way to other clubhouses.

He faced problems from Japanese fans and baseball writers, who were also slow to accept him. Giants fans loved Yonamine, but fans of other teams focused on his American heritage to jeer at him. Though every player faces jeering, Japanese fans were far more emphatic, particularly in the shadow of World War II. Riots at games weren’t uncommon, and Yonamine faced life-threatening situations more than once.

Like Jackie Robinson, Yonamine endured opposition from fans, opponents, and even his teammates—the only player never to accept him was the haughty, cold Giants’ team captain, Tetsuharu “The God of Batting” Kawakami. He was voted league MVP only once, despite being a better candidate several other seasons, and was denied a managerial position for nearly a decade (he got his comeuppance when his team won the Japan Series in his third year at the helm).

But his quiet endurance—and baseball excellence—against these odds changed Japanese baseball forever. He would blaze a trail that many other Americans followed, and his tactical revolution would pave the way for the Asian Invasion begun by Ichiro Suzuki. Without the influence of Yonamine, Japanese players would have never had the skills to succeed in MLB.

His refusal to follow rigid Japanese tradition changed the locker room dynamic and had a profound impact on at least one adoring fan. Though most stars rarely gave autographs to clamoring youngsters, Yonamine always signed for them. After obtaining an autograph from Yonamine, a young Sadaharu Oh became even more determined to become a baseball player—Oh would later become a teammate of Yonamine and the Home Run King of Japanese baseball (with 868 longballs).

That’s why he is such a suitable person to celebrate on Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday. Though he made his mark many years before King (and a handful of seasons before Jackie Robinson), Yonamine fits into the same proud, nonviolent tradition that shattered racial barriers, and changed two worlds for the better.

And Fitts’ wonderful book is an amazing way to experience, and pay tribute to, this baseball hero.