{"id":389371,"date":"2026-01-05T10:34:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-05T10:34:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/389371\/"},"modified":"2026-01-05T10:34:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-05T10:34:12","slug":"by-signing-kazuma-okamoto-the-blue-jays-are-starting-to-look-like-a-team-of-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/389371\/","title":{"rendered":"By signing Kazuma Okamoto, the Blue Jays are starting to look like a team of the world"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Yomiuri Giants infielder Kazuma Okamoto is reportedly headed to the Blue Jays, with some worrying that the signing would mark the end of Bo Bichette’s time with the organization.Hiro Komae\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n

Though they were a little preoccupied at the time, a few things must have seeped in for the Toronto Blue Jays\u2019<\/a> management during their last trip to Dodger Stadium<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The souvenir shops, for instance. They are everywhere in that stadium, and they absolutely rammed at all times with people begging staff to take their money. I\u2019ve been in some souvenir shops, but I\u2019ve never seen anything like that \u2013 Cabbage-Patch-Kid-level consumer hysteria. The hottest items were Japanese-scripted Shohei Ohtani tees. <\/p>\n

Ditto in the stands, especially the cheap(er) seats. Based on their choice of replica jersey, the Dodgers\u2019 middle-class Latino fanbase has two clear favourites \u2013 Ohtani and his countryman, Yoshinobu Yamamoto. Mookie Betts comes a distant third. And this was before Yamamoto\u2019s robotic excellence in the final two games of the World Series. <\/p>\n

A few baseball teams are sexy, but only the Dodgers feel truly cosmopolitan. They give off the same global whiff as a Real Madrid or a Bayern Munich. The best of the best coming together for one mission \u2013 making the \u2018world\u2019 in World Series make sense. <\/p>\n

Now if Americans are getting tired of Americans, imagine how Canadians feel. <\/p>\n

Cathal Kelly: Canada’s fall love affair with the Blue Jays makes them the country’s sports story of the year<\/a><\/p>\n

Enter Kazuma Okamoto. On Sunday, the Jays agreed to a four-year, US$60-million deal<\/a> with the 29-year-old infielder. He comes via the Yomiuri Giants, the most storied team in Japanese baseball. <\/p>\n

Most of the reporting on this deal has focused on Okamoto\u2019s skillset. He hits home runs and doesn\u2019t strike out a ton. That\u2019s about it. He plays third, but he\u2019d probably be more useful at first \u2013 which is where Vladimir Guerrero Jr. will be stationed for the foreseeable future. He could also play in the outfield. <\/p>\n

People are also concerned that this means Bo Bichette will not be returning and\/or that Kyle Tucker will not be arriving in the first place. For a change, the Blue Jays aren\u2019t sitting around waiting for people to use them as leverage in negotiations with other teams. Instead, they\u2019re the ones doing the leveraging. <\/p>\n

Tucker can afford to sign a high-dollar, short-term deal and wait for his nine-figure ship to come in. Bichette, who\u2019s beginning to show signs of wear, doesn\u2019t have the same options. The off-season windows for both men are starting to inch closed. The Jays are the ones who started pushing down. <\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Kazuma Okamoto, right, seen here celebrating a home run in the 2023 World Baseball Classic, could bring the Jays into the Japanese baseball spotlight, if he becomes a contributor to his new club.Rhona Wise<\/p>\n

Okamoto provides a power bat for accessible luxury prices, but that\u2019s a parochial way of thinking about it. Okamoto makes the Jays more of a team of the world, rather than just a team of America Jr. <\/p>\n

Management has done a solid job of drilling this \u201cplaying for a whole country\u201d concept into the Jays\u2019 heads. The players never stop saying it in interviews. But however likeable they are, it\u2019s still a bunch of Americans talking Canadiana at Canadians. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s not going to work long-term. It\u2019s especially not going to work if you end up stuck with a few churls who don\u2019t believe it or won\u2019t say it. All it takes is the word \u201c51st\u201d to come out of the mouth of one hillbilly and all this good feeling the Jays have worked so hard to cultivate is vaporized. <\/p>\n

The best way to strike the outsider tone the Jays favour is with outsiders. None are hotter right now than the Japanese. They cut regal figures, and are uniformly charming. Stood alongside homegrown athletes \u2013 many of whom are transparently grasping and bright as a box of rocks \u2013 they are an advertiser\u2019s dream.<\/p>\n

Nice, soft-spoken guys are back in style (in sports, at least). This is the Ohtani Effect. <\/p>\n

Cathal Kelly: Canada’s red-and-white tide of patriotic fervour ready to rise in 2026<\/a><\/p>\n

As they currently stand, the Jays are starting to develop the same sort of international flavour as the Dodgers. Next season, Toronto\u2019s best team will include a Japanese player, a couple of Dominicans, a Mexican, two Venezuelans, a Puerto Rican and a guy from Pomona via Daejeon, South Korea. <\/p>\n

That isn\u2019t a baseball team. It\u2019s the start of The Magnificent Seven.<\/p>\n

Imagine how sad the Maple Leafs feel right now, with their dreary collection of Canadians, Americans and Scandinavians, all of whom look identical, and think and say the exact same things.<\/p>\n

All that said, Okamoto still has to be good. The Jays have had Japanese players before. Infielder Munenori Kawasaki was so cute you wanted to pinch him, but he could just barely make contact with a baseball. Pitchers Tomo Ohka and Yusei Kikuchi were reasonably effective, but both men lit up a room like a stone plinth. <\/p>\n

In order to justify his signing, Okamoto needs to hit a few long balls, sure, but he also needs to be fun to watch. <\/p>\n

Toronto Blue Jays named CP team of the year after electrifying playoff run<\/a><\/p>\n

That would open up all sorts of marketing opportunities. It might encourage some Japanese press to join the team, which would in turn put the Jays on the map in Japan. If Okamoto\u2019s a real hit, you\u2019ll see a horde of Canadian 10-year-olds wearing his t-shirt styled in Kanji. <\/p>\n

Just a couple of years ago, it was considered inevitable that American sports leagues would begin to spread around the world. Eventually, there would be an NFL team in Mexico City and an NBA team in London. <\/p>\n

How likely does that seem now? Not very. The world has stopped shrinking. It\u2019s getting bigger, in a hurry. <\/p>\n

If things continue this way, the tug for non-American, non-hockey franchises to return to the motherland will be felt at some point. <\/p>\n

Obviously, there is no good financial or legal argument for that to happen. But, again, do you get the strong feeling that legality and good sense are the things which are going to define our near-term future relations with our next-door neighbour?<\/p>\n

It behooves Canadian teams to differentiate themselves right now as teams of the world, playing a unique role in a nation that stands outside the American mainstream. Hiring abroad is the smartest way to do that. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Yomiuri Giants infielder Kazuma Okamoto is reportedly headed to the Blue Jays, with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":389372,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,2922,82,8023],"class_list":{"0":"post-389371","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-noastack","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-topstory"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=389371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389371\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/389372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=389371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=389371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=389371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}