Wang Emerges As Cy Young Candidate

An Asian wind is blowing in the Major Leagues. The hero of this syndrome is Wang Jianmin (26, New York Yankees), a pitcher from Taiwan.

Wang Jianmin won his 16th victory (5 defeats) against Detroit yesterday, one of the two teams with the highest winning percentage in the league, without losing a point over seven two-thirds innings. He is the co-winner of the biggest number of victories in Major League. With such current he can expect not only to break the record of the biggest number of victories in a season among Asian players that Park Chan-ho (San Diego Padres) recorded (2000, 18 victories) but also to make 20 victories.

The official home page of Major League even used the expression Cy Wang, a description comparing Wang with the legendary pitcher Cy Young.

On Korean Major League web boards, arguments are being raised as to which one of the two, Wang Jianmin and Park Chan-ho, is superior to the other. It is not very meaningful to compare Wang Jianmin who is going through his 2nd year at ML against Park Chan-ho who has won 113 games in total. But it is true that the two resemble each other.

Taiwanese National Flag Hung in Yankee Stadium When Wang Is a Starter-

In late 1990s when the people were blue with the Asian crisis, Koreans saw hope in Park Chan-ho throwing fastballs and striking out tall big-leaguers.

Now the Taiwanese feel proud watching Wang Jianmin. Taiwan is not allowed to hang its own national flag in international athletic events such as the Olympic Games. They use the Olympic flag instead because of the pressure from China. But when Wang Jianmin plays the game as a starter, the Taiwanese national flag is hung up in Yankee Stadium.

It was his fastballs speeding as high as late 150km, the big angled curves, and the “slurve,” a mix between a slider and a curveball, that enable Park to get outs.

Wang Jianmin also can throw as fast as mid 150km. But out of his 187 innings the number of strikeouts he has is only 62. It is because his main weapon is throwing sinkers. A sinker is a ball that flies straight like a straight ball but falls right down in front of the batter.

Wang Jianmin became a model grounder pitcher thanks to his sinkers. Out of the 87 pitchers who played more than 126 innings this year, it is Wang Jianmin that has the lowest number of strikeouts in nine innings (2.98).

Until early 2000s, the talk of Korean baseball world was all Park Chan-ho. The same is happening in Taiwan. When Wang Jianmin is on the mound, the first page of the newspapers and the first news of TVs are all about Wang Jianmin.

Park Chan-ho weakened the popularity of Korean pro baseball. The Taiwanese rarely watch games of the Taiwanese pro league these days. Instead they focus their eyes and ears on the broadcasting of the games Wang Jianmin plays.

uni@donga.com