How will Japanese players fare in 2010, according to the Bill James Handbook

I was inspired by Boston Globe’s Chad Finn’s posting on Extra Bases blog called Some interesting numbers via Bill James , and decided to look up what the projections of Japanese players for the year 2010 from the 2010 edition of the Bill James Handbook.

According to James and his company, Ichiro will make History and become the only player ever to record 200 or more hits in 10 or more seasons (also extending his own record of consecutive years). Many people would expect Ichiro to do this (yours truly included) and it continues to amaze me taht every year, so much expectation is riding on him.

Speaking of expectation, James predicts that Daisuke Matsuzaka will rebound and pitch 195 innings, which would be second most since 2007. Even though his win-loss ratio is projected to be lower than the first 2 years of his career, I think most Red Sox nation will be happy to have him go 195 innings and 12-10. Project 184Ks wil he his second highest in his MLB career as well.

Another projected career high is former Chunichi Dragons Kosuke Fukudome’s HR and RBI. Fukudome had 10-58 rookie year and 11-54 last year. James projection for 2010 is 13-61. Not a huge jump but higher than last two years is encouraging (though it does not match his salery… but that is not really his fault. – debate for another day perhaps.)

I would have like to see what the projection for Kenshin Kawakami (another former Chunichi Dragons) would be like. I assume they didn’t project his number, probably because the calculation was done before Javier Vasquez trade, without of which would have made Kawakami out of Braves rotation. His record 7-12 in 2009 was disappointing. I didn’t get to watch may of his games, I admit, but ones that I saw, he wasn’t too bad. I’d imagine his projection would have been close to .500 winning percentage. Also interesting note is that Koji Uehara has 2 saves. and Hideki Matsui is projected for 23 home runs, but he is hoping that Angels use him in the outfield and get more at bats, it is not impossible to surpass his MLB career home run record of 31, set in 2004 (his second MLB years). I can’t wait for the season to begin!

2010 Japanese Hitter Projections

2010 Japanese Pitcher Projections