The Mariners are going to Japan next March to begin the 2012 season against the A’s – that news was announced this morning – and it brought back the memory of one of the bigger disappointments for a lot of us covering the team.
Eight and a half years ago, I sat in the media
workroom at the Mariners’ spring training complex in Arizona as Bob Dupuy of baseball’s Commissioner’s Office walked in with a glum look on his face. In 12 hours, the Mariners and media covering the team (including me) were scheduled to lift off on a flight for Tokyo, where the team was to begin the 2003 season in Japan against the Oakland A’s.
However, with missiles and bombs exploding in Iraq from a war that had broken out the previous day, MLB decided it was too risky to send the teams overseas. We were less than two years removed from the 9-11 attacks, and the fear was very real that a couple of big-league teams from the States could be targets.
So Dupuy stood in that room in Peoria, Ariz., and told us the trip was off.
It wiped out many months of planning by MLB, the Mariners and A’s, not to mention myself. So worried that I’d lose track of what time it was in Japan – or even what day it was considering the 16-hour time difference — I put together an intricate chart so I wouldn’t miss deadline with any of my stories. I’d also bought a new sport coat because that was required of all men making the trip (sportswriter attire was not proper for travel, although we did learn that you can dress up a pig). My family also was making that trip, and we’d booked a flight from Seattle that would have them arriving at nearly the same time as the flight carrying the Mariners’ party. For a lot of us, it was going to be the trip of a lifetime.
Instead, the Mariners remained in Arizona for another two weeks of spring training, my family cancelled its reservations and I, having already checked out of my Arizona apartment, returned home and missed the continuation of an extra long spring training.
Like I said, it was one of the great disappointments of my career. I’d made some friends with the Japanese writers here covering Ichiro Suzuki and I looked forward to putting myself in their shoes –adjusting to a different country, different culture – if only for a few days. I’d always been intrigued by stories I’d heard and read about baseball in Japan. Former Mariner Jamie Moyer raved about the reception he received there when he played with a group of major league stars in a postseason exhibition.
We’d always thought the Mariners would go Japan to make up the trip they lost in 2003, but I never thought it would take this long. The series next year – March 28-29 – will be the fourth time the major league season has opened in Japan. The last time was 2008 when the Red Sox and A’s played at the Tokyo Dome.
The Mariners will be the road team in both games against the A’s and will play 81 home games as scheduled in 2012. Games that were scheduled at Oakland on April 8 (a Sunday) and July 5 (a Thursday) will be off days.
The nine-day Japan trip will essentially be a mid-spring training break, with the Mariners leaving Phoenix on March 22 and playing two exhibition games plus the regular-season games against the A’s, then returning to Phoenix on March 30.
They’ll begin the U.S. portion of their schedule April 6 at Oakland and open their home schedule April 13 at Safeco Field as originally scheduled.
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