Feb 2020 – Craig Brazell

HTEN: With us today is former Hanshin Tigers import Craig Brazell. Thanks for joining us today. 

Craig Brazell (CB): No problem at all! Glad to be here. 

The Early Years

HTEN: Well, we’ve been trying to get in touch with you for about a year now, so it’s good to finally hook up. I want to talk to you a little bit about your childhood. How big a part did baseball play in your childhood?

CB: Baseball was there from the day I was born. My father managed a team in the Detroit Tigers organization. He was actually on a road trip when I was born. A friend of ours took my mother to the hospital the night I was born. So pretty much from the day I was born, I was in a minor-league clubhouse and around the game. My parents make fun of me being under the bleachers, sitting under a fold-down chair while my dad was managing. That was at three weeks old. So yeah, I would have to say baseball was a big part of my childhood.

HTEN: When did you actually start playing, and what position did you play?

CB: I started when I was four or five years old; pretty much every kid was playing ball. Pretty much up from the time I was 8 years old, I was a catcher. I caught all the way through high school, but I always wanted to be a shortstop, but I was too big. In those days, you didn’t want a 6’3″ shortstop. So that was the biggest part of my growing up, was being a catcher. I loved being a catcher, putting on the equipment, getting out there and getting dirty.

HTEN: Did you have a favorite team to watch or favorite player that you idolized growing up?

CB: You know, growing up in Alabama, you always had the Atlanta Braves… but I always remember the bad years of the Braves. In the late 80s and early 90s, you didn’t have to worry about getting a ticket to the game. A lot of times they would let you in for free, it was so bad. So growing up, we went to a lot of Braves games, but my parents were from St. Louis, so one of my favorite players was Ozzie Smith. I love watching him play shortstop. But as I got older, being from down south, it was guys like Chipper Jones, and as a catcher, I loved Darren Daulton and Mike Piazza. Those are some of the guys that I grew up watching a lot.

HTEN: When you were scouted and drafted, were you chosen as a catcher, or did the team already have a vision for you to be play a different position?

CB: I was drafted as a catcher, but the Mets traded for some guy named Piazza… I don’t know if he was any good. I’ve heard of him a few times. (Laughs) They had every intention of me being a catcher, but I think things led to me being better suited either at first base or the outfield, and that’s how it ended up.

The NPB Years

HTEN: What was the transition like coming to NPB? How did you first hear about baseball in Japan, and what was your reaction when you heard that there was some interest in you?

CB: You know, in 2005 or 2006, I was with the Dodgers, and I had a hitting coach by the name of Mike Easler, and he played in Japan (for the Nippon-Ham Fighters). He talked to me a good bit, saying, “You would do well in Japan, it’s something you should look into.” I was coming off a year where I had had an injury and rehab. That year, Terry Collins was actually the minor league director for the Dodgers and he gave me a job. Then the next year, I went to Kansas City. They asked me in the middle of the season if I wanted to go to Japan. I was like, “You know, I’m leading all of baseball in home runs, I have a chance for a Triple Crown…” I mean it was a heck of a year, and I was like, “No, I’m not going. I’m focusing on what’s going on right now.” Then I ended up getting called up to the big leagues but I didn’t get to play much. It was kind of a courtesy call-up, since I was having such a good year. They gave me a month, like four pinch hits, and I went one-for-four. I got a hit against the Yankees, so that’s a big plus. Then in the offseason, I changed agents, and next thing you know, I got a call from him, and he said, “Hey, we’ve got a lot of interest in Japan, what are your thoughts?” My first thought was, “Yeah, a lot of guys go over for a year, have a good year, come back and go to the big leagues.” I wasn’t thinking at the time that I would spend the next seven years over there. And I’d heard so many different things about Japan. Obviously, going to the Seibu Lions to begin with, you hear of guys like Alex Cabrera and Daisuke (Matsuzaka)… the team had a bit of notoriety, but I still really didn’t know that much about Japanese baseball until I got over there. One of the biggest people that influenced me when I got up there was Alex Ramirez (then outfielder for Yomiuri, now manager of the Yokohama BayStars). I met Rammy when I was with Seibu, and talked to him a good bit there, and obviously became pretty good friends with him once I came to the Tigers. But I can honestly say that I didn’t envision being there for seven years. 

HTEN: That’s kind of the common thread that I hear from a lot of guys that I talk to, and that’s even true in my life. Anyways, what do you feel went well when you were with the Lions? What were some of the highlights of your time with them? 

CB: My time with the Lions didn’t end the way I hoped. I took a ball to the head, and that’s kind of how my career ended with them. But being on that team in my first year in Japan, being on a team that won the Japan Series, and playing with that young group of guys, like (Hiroyuki) Nakajima, (Yasuyuki) Kataoka, (Hideaki) Wakui… I mean a lot of those guys were so instrumental to the team winning. It was just a highlight playing over there, and obviously, so was the first time I got to play the Giants. Because I mean, as a foreigner, you first hear about the Tokyo Giants. That was a big thrill, going in and hitting two home runs in the Tokyo Dome. I’m going, wow, this is pretty cool, playing here. The first year over there was very tough for me, though, and I think it is for a lot of guys. 

HTEN: But somehow despite it being a tough year, you stayed in Japan. After that one year with Seibu, how were you brought into the Tigers organization?

CB: After that season, Baltimore signed me, and so I went to camp with them, but they literally released me the day before Opening Day, so I was kind of stuck. Not many places to go from there. So I went home, thought for a little while. My agent called and said, “Hey, let’s go play independent ball for a couple of weeks and see what happens.” So I go up to Saint Paul (Minnesota), and I think I ended up playing five or six games there, and I was putting up some unbelievable, ridiculous numbers. I think at the time, Kevin Mench was with the Tigers but he wasn’t doing anything. So the Tigers came in… well actually, they didn’t even come in, they watched some video online of me playing, called my agent, did a contract. I was getting ready to go out and play that night, and my agent got a hold of the manager and said, “He’s not to play tonight, he’s been signed by a team back in Japan.” My wife had a big part in that, I mean, she was constantly on the phone with my agent. When everything came to fruition, I think it was probably four days later, I arrived in Osaka. And it took a couple of days to adjust and I played in a couple of minor league games, and then they put me right in the fire against Orix. But it was nice to play against them right away, since I had played against them the whole year before. I think I ended up 3-for-5 my first night, with a home run. I got to really see what Hanshin was about, and how crazy the fans are, and how Koshien is such an unbelievable place to play. And that’s kind of how my time started with Hanshin.

HTEN: You spent most of 2009 right through until 2012 with the team, and had a lot of teammates come and go. Tell us about some of the teammates that you remember and have fond memories of.

CB: You know, that was a great group of guys there. I was fortunate to get to play with Kanemoto-san and Yano-san. And obviously, Kane was the manager for a while and now Yano’s the manager. There’s such a long history of players with Hanshin. I mean, playing with Takashi Toritani, Takahiro Arai, I mean I think that might have been one of the best infields at the time. There were some great guys on that field, and I was lucky enough to get to play with them. And then obviously the next year in 2010, Matt Murton comes along and we had Kenji Johjima also. I think everybody on the team had a heck of a year that year.  So it was a great time, but really, the memories I have include watching Kanemoto and his streak, watching Yano. There were just some great players on that team. It was a privilege to play with them.

HTEN: Is there anything you remember a coach or manager telling you that has stuck with you through the years?

CB: You know, having Yutaka Wada as a hitting coach was such a big thing, and Mayumi-san as a manager… they were very easy-going. Someone, I forget who, told me, “Just relax, go out there and play the game. Quit thinking so much.” And then again, I mean, playing with Kanemoto and watching what he did, knowing that he is a power hitter, and I can kind of look at what he does. I mean, I didn’t have the eye that he had at the plate. Then I can go back to Alex Ramirez. He was a big part of my game, too. I mean, we had endless conversations about hitting in Japan, and I remember he told me to quit trying to pull the ball so much. Hit these guys the other way. Go with these pitches, and pitchers will start to give you more to hit. Once I figured that out, it changed the game, and then I think the biggest thing I learned was, forget everything you know about American baseball. Learn Japan, play their game, and insert what you do best into their game when you can. I think that’s what gets to a lot of players. They come over thinking they are going to hit a bunch of home runs off these little bitty guys. But no, these little bitty guys can throw hard and nasty stuff.

HTEN: We’ve seen that as a lot of foreigners have come and gone without achieving the success that they and the team expected them to have. What was it like at the end of your run with Hanshin? Can you tell us a little about how you guys parted ways, and then how you got set up with Chiba Lotte after that?

CB: I think my time with Hanshin had just gotten to a point where after being there four years, they were ready to move on. I kind of saw the writing on the wall, also. But I just kind of went with it. I wasn’t going to say anything bad about Hanshin, because they did so much for me. I kind of went with the approach of, “OK, I’m not going to say anything bad about you, so you don’t say anything bad about me.” I respect everything that Hanshin and Japan stand for. So towards the end of everything, I was kind of down to just pinch-hitting, and I was actually not too bad at it. I think they were in Tokyo, and they called me in and said, “We’re going to let you go home now.” I think there was still a month and a half left in the season, but I was like, “Alright.” I think I was still leading the team in home runs with 11 or 12, and I still ended up leading that year. It was funny. Then the next year, I really didn’t want to play. I had just put in my mind that I was done. The manager of the independent team in Saint Paul called me and said, “Hey do you want to come up as a player-coach?” I went, “Alright, I guess so.” I really didn’t have the heart to do it, but I went and spent a couple of weeks up there, and the next thing you know, my wife finds that Chiba is looking for another foreigner. They came in, watched me play, and I think the night they watched me, I hit a grand slam. The next day they signed me, and a couple of days later, I was in Chiba. I don’t even remember, but I might have played one minor-league game, and then went up to the top squad. We had a pretty good year that year, made the playoffs, but we got beaten by Rakuten. Their pitching was unbelievable that year. I played the next year, and unfortunately, I ended my career getting hit in the head, and that was all she wrote.

The Post-NPB Years

HTEN: So now it’s been about five, six years since your retirement. What have you been up to since 2015?

CB: I actually own a chain of fitness studios called Club Pilates. They’re trying to make them in Japan, but they don’t want anything to do with me. I guess they don’t think I have a good enough name to come to Japan and help promote them! But I’ve got three of them right now. We have actually moved from Montgomery, Alabama, to Auburn, right around the corner from Auburn University. Since leaving Japan, we’ve had two more children, so I’ve got three boys now: Trot (10), Tagg (5), and Tipp (3), whose middle name is Koshien.

HTEN: I see you have baseball-type names for all three of them, right?

CB: Yes, and Tipp actually was named after a character in a movie. He loves that his name came from that movie, but yeah, I actually had a lot of those (tips) in my career. But basically that’s what I’ve been up to, in a nutshell.

HTEN: So how’s the business going? What was the thinking behind trying to bring it to Japan, instead of expanding in America first?

CB: The pilates studio was a thing my wife started. I had my time, and she pretty much gave up her career to go with me, and do baseball. So she wanted to get into something, and I went along with it, and we’ve got the three studios here in Alabama. Club Pilates actually is a franchise, I think they just opened one in Tokyo. They plan on putting them all over Japan, and they just haven’t come up with the right offer for me to come over and help promote them, you know? It’s just… running three of my own, it’s kind of difficult to get away to go help somebody else on the other side of the world open up some other ones, and take away from my business.

HTEN: We’ll be on the lookout for those, especially when they come out to Osaka. Now, do you practice pilates as well?

CB: When I get an opportunity to, I do. But I work more now than I did when I played baseball, I have to tell you that.

HTEN: What are the benefits that you get out of pilates, that you might be able to sell your product to other people?

CB: You know, it is a workout that doesn’t hurt at all. I mean, it stretches, strengthens, and lengthens your body, and I’m seeing a lot of athletes turning to it now because they are realizing that being this big bulky guy isn’t what it’s all cracked up to be when you’re trying to play baseball. I mean, what you want is longevity. I’m probably more flexible now than I was when I was playing. It’s such a great workout, it’s easy on the joints, and we actually have a lot of professional football players coming to us here in Auburn, and some younger baseball players as well. They have noticed such a difference in their range of motion, their flexibility, and their ability to stay on the field.

HTEN: That’s it. I’m telling the Tigers that they need to bring in one of your trainers and get pilates going for them as well!

CB: It would be a great thing, I mean, pilates is an unbelievable workout. It’s not like throwing around a bunch of weights. Pilates has been around since World War I. It was originally started as a form of rehab for soldiers to get better and get back out on the battlefield.

HTEN: Alright, I just want to end things off by letting you talk a little bit about your thoughts on the 2020 Hanshin Tigers, your thoughts about Yano as a manager, and also, as we both know, there is a certain guy on the Tigers right now, Justin Bour, who is being compared to both you and another man whose name starts with B.

CB: Getting the kiss of death from the media, haha. Yeah, when you get compared to Randy Bass it is one thing to have a good spring, but you’ve got some pretty big shoes to fill. Yano will be a great manager. He understands the game, he caught for such a long time and knows how to control the game, which helps as a manager. So the biggest thing I can say is, be patient with the foreign players. Don’t do the normal cutthroat after one month, because it does take a good bit of time. I’m sure Bour will come out the chute, first 2-3 series banging away, but then teams adjust. I mean, I tell people, if you want to see what Japanese baseball is like, watch Mr. Baseball. Even though it’s an old movie, it is very accurate. This would be my biggest advice to Bour: forget what you know and listen to the hitting coach. It’s (Atsushi) Kataoka, right?

HTEN: It was, but they have moved on. Ryota Arai is one of the top squad hitting coaches.

CB: Ryota is??? So, little Arai is one of the hitting coaches? OK. Well, Ryota is smart enough to know from playing with some foreigners that knew how to hit, to be patient, to realize, you’ve got to work with these guys. You can’t just give up on them. He’s got to teach these guys, hey, you’ve got to hit the other way, or these Japanese pitchers are going to eat you alive. You’d better be ready for a steady diet of splits, sliders, everything in the dirt, and understand that the man in blue behind you, you better show him a lot of respect, because that strike zone is going to be big until they realize that you respect them.

HTEN: Interesting.

CB: There’s a lot that goes into the game over there that I figured out over my seven years. I would also tell him, learn a little Japanese, because there are times that the first base coach will walk over to their player and tell him to steal, not thinking that you understand Japanese.

HTEN: There you go, those little things to get an edge in your game. Well Craig, I appreciate you taking the time to talk with us today. We will continue to support you in your endeavors in this new career, yourself and your wife. Please say hi to your sons, especially little Koshien. We look forward to seeing them, and you, at Koshien someday!

CB: Oh yeah, we’ll get back there one day, just trying to figure out when.