CHARLESTON – After 196 home runs, 570 RBIs and almost 1,300 major league games, there is still a lot that Justin Smoak can give to baseball.
If he’s on the other side of the world while doing this, well, that’s where the game takes him.
“I don’t know if the Japanese will ever be part of my language,” said Smoak, the harsh open air accent still in his voice after five stops in the Major League Baseball for the past 11 years. “We are going to find out a few things. It will definitely be an experience. “
Smoak will play this season with Tokyo’s Yomiuri Giants, after signing a contract that is supposedly worth more than $ 6 million. With his family in tow.
“About a week after the season ended, my agent mentioned it could be an opportunity,” said Smoak. “My first thought was, ‘I will never think about it’. We moved on and got to the point where there were teams interested here, but it definitely wouldn’t be a good free agent market.
“It happened about two or three weeks ago and I had to sit down and start thinking about some things seriously. And here we are. “
Smoak, his wife Kristin and their two daughters, aged 2 and 6, were leaving on Thursday, but the pandemic forced him to stop. The family cannot even apply for a visa until January 31, so it may be mid-February before they can board a plane, and then they have to be quarantined for two weeks once they arrive.
The season is almost like the MLB season, starting in March / April and ending in October, although it is a schedule of 146 games in Japan, instead of 162 in the United States. Smoak has been keeping fit at home and using The Citadel’s batting cages during the off-season before he left.
It will not be the first time that Smoak will play in his future home. He was with Seattle when the Mariners opened the 2012 season with a series of two games against Oakland at the Tokyo Dome.
He hit cleanup behind Ichiro Suzuki and scored a home run in the second game.
Now, he will try to do this more often in 73 home games and 73 around the Central League.
“They take care of their travel and basically everything else, like accommodation, travel, food …” said Smoak. “It will be a change of pace and we will embrace it.”
Smoak became a legendary figure at USC before he even took his first hit. A 6-4 juicer who turned down a 16º– chosen to come to school, he performed for the first time and the longtime USC marker commented: “That boy just looks like a baseball player. “
His strokes became mandatory, Smoak attacking 62 home runs and driving in 207 during his three-year career. Those helped make him number 11 in the 2008 draft and Smoak went to the minor leagues.
He debuted in 2010 for the Texas Rangers and was traded mid-year to Seattle, where he played until 2014. After his release, he was hired by Toronto, and it was there that he had his best stretch and best season, breaking 38 dingers and 90 RBIs in 2017, earning his only All-Star appearance.
Smoak played 33 games with Milwaukee last year and three with San Francisco, and spent the off-season doing what he usually does – training, hunting and fishing. As he said, the free agent market was not teeming with offers, so when Japan appeared, he listened.
“I will have my own interpreter and, as a personal concierge, who will take care of almost everything,” said Smoak. “My wife immersed herself in everything. There is a 30-minute Disney World, and our oldest daughter can go to different school programs and activities. “
The only regret he has about the next step in his baseball career is to give up fishing in Lowcountry, as it was incredible this season.
But another incredible season may be waiting abroad.
Follow David Cloninger on Twitter @DCPandC.