Disabled Players

While I'm sure you posted your message with the best of intentions, it is a little insensitive. Why should deafness be considered a disability in baseball? Are you aware of the contributions that deaf players have made to the game?

Not insensitive at all - in Japan this sort of thing is a big hurdle, and the fact that Ishii was disabled merited a special item on him on Japanese television (NHK no less) several months ago.

Actually "this sort of thing" is a big hurdle everywhere, not just in Japan. Unfortunately this sort of attitude perpetuates discrimination. But please don't take this as a personal attack (as I appreciate your posts sticking up for Kataoka). The question remains, how would deafness be a disability in baseball? What is the relationship between hearing and pitching? In Japan (and in other countries as well) there is a national deaf baseball association. And wasn't there a case several years ago where a deaf school from Okinawa made it to the National High School Baseball Tournament but were not allowed to play (discrimination desho)?

Rather than "disabled," it might be more helpful to think of deaf people as a linguistic minority. Gaijin players get interpreters - so if there are any communication problems with deaf players, why shouldn't they have a sign language interpreter?

Perhaps I should explain further, the general attitude is that deafness is a disability in baseball despite no evidence supporting this view. I, like you, don't see it as a disability, and in the TV interview Ishii was an articulate and likeable young man. Should he succeed, he will open the door for other deaf people to follow and (like wearing glasses) hopefully it will become unremarkable.

My comment was not saying that Ishii had surprisingly succeeded, but that he had been able to overcome the prejudice. This, I think, needs to be celebrated and highlighted as a step in the right direction.

That's putting a lot of pressure on the likeable young man. So if he does poorly, no more deaf players? One could make an arguement that poor eyesight/wearing glasses is a disability in professional baseball. One has to see the ball, right? My question has been, does one need to have "normal" hearing to play baseball?

I'm not sure if this is the forum to discuss discrimination and prejudice in Japanese society, but can we discuss it within the context of NPB? Does anybody out there want to share stories about the contribitions to baseball by deaf players? Yoroshiku.

- I'm not sure if this is the forum to discuss discrimination and prejudice in Japanese society, but can we discuss it within the context of NPB?

I'd prefer things were kept in an NPB context, but am open to social issues for the handicapped in Japan. I'd just like to avoid the discussion turning all MLB (which happens a lot). Information about deaf players in MLB is more than abundant in English on the Net. Google has approximately 13,100 hits for "Dummy Hoy" (include the quotes in the search) to give you an idea.

P.S. My wife is in a wheelchair (Polio when she was 3), so I'm very familiar with progress in making things barrier free here in Japan over the past decade. The blind appear to have a good lobby group, getting deko-boko (bumped) plates installed throughout major residential and business areas, at least in the Kanto Area. Brail is pretty standard on elevators manufactured within the past 15 years. But I'm unsure about what has been done to help the deaf in society as a whole, or baseball in particular.

I believe the argument about eyesight was one that was used in the past. Of course it is absurd and has been proven wrong, but the apparent reason that Furuta did not play for the Hanshin Tigers (like he wanted to) was because he wore glasses.

To some extent Ishii is a pioneer, and sometimes they do fail (which as Gern says, is a pity for such a likeable young man). But if no one tries the prejudice remains and frequently the pioneer has done enough to break down the barriers for others to follow.

I don't think that what happens in MLB with regard to deaf players would have any bearing on NPB. The change has to come from within NPB itself. However, given that foreign players cannot necessarily understand much Japanese, I don't think that speaking is vital.

Incidently Westbaystars - your wife wouldn't be able to access the building where I work, it has no disabled access at all. So help and provision seems to be patchy.