Japanese HOF Project

[nat]

Takao Kajimoto is a hall of famer and Meikyukai member who pitched for the Braves. He was featured in one on the earliest posts in this thread (which weren’t very high quality) so I’ll try to do better here.

Kajimoto pitched from 1954 to 1973, compiling a record of 254-255 (that’s right, a losing record). I wonder if that’s the highest number of wins for a pitcher with a losing record? My guess would be “yes”. Wikipedia (Japanese version) says that it is the highest total for anyone to have never led the league in wins, which also sounds plausible. Although he was a 12x all-star, he was selected for just a single best-nine team.

Kajimoto’s father died when he was in middle school, and he was raised by his mother alone thereafter. He was a sensation as a rookie, signing directly out of high school with a 93 mph fastball.

With a rotation led by Kajimoto and Tetsuya Yoneda, Hankyu has something of a golden age in the late 1960s. Unfortunately, they ran into the buzz saw of the V9 Giants, and didn’t manage to win the Japan Series. For a while the Dodgers did a lot of things with various Japanese teams, and in the late 1950s they went to Japan to play against an all-star team. This could have turned out better for Kajimoto. He started the Oct. 31st, 1956 game, and Gino Cimoli hit a line drive that bounced off of Kajimoto’s shoulder (ouch!) and went for a triple.

After he retired Kajimoto spent many years as a coach. His advice to (at least some of his pitchers) was… peculiar. Apparently he recommended drinking before appearing in a game, on the grounds that it worked for him. There’s a reason that anecdotes don’t really count as evidence. #obviouslybadideas.

Kajimoto still holds the record for consecutive batters struck out, at nine. His pitch of choice was something that Google Translate’s version of Kajimoto’s Japanese Wikipedia page is calling a ‘palm ball’, which I gather is a kind of change up. A good change up is a nice thing to have if you can pair it was a blazing fastball. (Or, well, blazing in context. No one is going to be impressed with a 93mph fastball anymore.)

Meikyukai – Yes (he was one of the founding members) : Hall of Fame – Yes

My card is from the JCM 43a set. It’s one of a bunch of almost indistinguishable sets released between c. 1958 and 1960.