Why do Foreign Players Head Home Before the Season Ends?

I think part of it has to do with the fact that the regular season has no real definite stopping point. I believe Yokohama played a regular season game on the same day as Game 1 of the Nihon Series. I did not understand that!

It is rather odd how Tuffy Rhodes departed from Yomiuri.

In response to Tuffy having returned, that was due to an injury. His circumstances are legitimate.

For others, I believe it's a matter of contract obligations and the purpose of make-up games. For example, at the beginning of the season, the schedule is made for up to the first days of October. Between October 4 and 20 (plus or minus on either end) are make-up games. Well, since all of those games in October aren't scheduled when the foreign player signs a contract, he figures that October is post-season, and if the team isn't in it, or if he isn't in contention for a title, the contract is up.

With little left to play for, the teams also often want to give some of their younger players a chance at ichi-gun, so they don't object to the opening up of some roster space.

It's seen as a mutually benificial policy.

I found it quite amazing that Alex Cabrera went home last Sunday before his team eventually lost to the Marines. Yes, he had a broken wrist, but when your team is in the playoffs, you would think he would be sitting on the bench and chearing them on. Why did he leave before the last game was even played? Where is his sportsmanship?

Any news on whether or not he will return to Japan? I do know his belongings have yet to be moved out of his house and the nameplate on his post box still reads Alex Cabrera. In other words, it appears he is still coming back for now.

The reason that most of these foreign players head home before the season ends is because most of these players are coddled and treated with kid gloves by their respective managers and front offices and usually get things their way. The foreign players here are treated way too well and are given way too many perks, in my opinion, compared to the Japanese players.

I once happened to be on the same plane from Tokyo to LA as outfielder Darrin Jackson (then with the Seibu Lions) back in the first week of October in 1995. I asked him why he was on his way back home when Seibu still had some games left. He replied, "They (Seibu) let me go home early."

If these teams had a backbone and held firm, they could make their foreigners stay till the very end of the season. I applaud the teams that make their foreigners show up at spring training on February 1st, the same day as the Japanese players. Warren Cromartie of the Giants used to always show up well into February for spring training. It used to always make me mad that they let him get away with that while the Giants' Japanese players were practicing their butts off.