Kazuyuki Shirai

From BR Bullpen

Kazuyuki Shirai (白井 一幸)

  • Bats Both, Throws Right
  • Height 5' 10", Weight 167 lb.

BR register page

Biographical Information[edit]

Kazuyuki Shirai has played in Nippon Pro Baseball.

Shirai was drafted by the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters in the first round of the 1983 NPB draft. He debuted on March 31, 1984, and collected his first major league hit from Keishi Suzuki in the same game. He was named the starting second baseman on opening day and ended up batting .208/.254/.262 in his rookie year. Shirai only batted .190/.279/.255 in the 1985, then improved to .231/.296/.346 in the 1986 season.

1987 was Shirai's career year. He was selected into the 1987 NPB All-Star Game, and went 2-for-2 in the Game 1 after replacing Daijiro Oishi in the 7th inning. The two singles were off Tatsuo Komatsu in the 7th and Yoshitaka Katori in the 9th inning. Shirai started in Game 2, was struck out by Suguru Egawa in the 2nd, then retired by Hisao Niura in the 4th inning. In the 7th inning, Shirai collected a single off Tadashi Sugimoto, then got the first extra-base hit in this event, a double against Akio Saito in the 9th inning. He ended up hitting .265/.322/.395 with a league-leading 30 sacrifice hits, and won both the Best Nine and NPB Gold Glove Award as a 2nd baseman.

Shirai fractured his foot and was limited to 40 games played in 1988. He came back soon, as he recorded a career-high 38 steals with a .242/.316/.320 batting line in 1989 season. He was second in stolen bases, 4 behind Pacific League leader Norifumi Nishimura. Shirai was injured again, and missed nearly the entire 1990 season because of a shoulder surgery.

The Kagawa native came back again in 1991, and participated in the All-Star Game again. He started in Game 1, but didn't have any hits in 5 at-bats combined in the two games. Shirai hit .311/.428/.415 with 4 homers, led the league in OBP, and ranked third in batting average (.003 behind Mitsuchika Hirai) in this season. He also won the NPB Comeback Player of the Year award. He struggled again in even-number years like Bret Saberhagen; he recorded a .215/.312/.288 batting average in 1992). Shirai bounced back and led the Pacific League in games played and at-bats in 1993; he had a .270/.356/.360 batting line and 26 steals. He broke the Pacific League record for 545 consecutive fielding chances without an error in 1995, then ended up batting .252/.350/.307 with 15 steals.

Shirai suffered from a knee injury and was limited to 32 games played in the 1995 season. The Fighters released him, and he transferred to the Orix Blue Wave. After only playing 13 games in 1996 season, Shirai announced his retirement, and became a coach. He was the head coach for the Fighters' minor team in 2000, then became their manager from 2001 to 2002. The Fighters promoted him to the major team as the head coach from 2003 to 2005, then turned into the defense coach in 2006. He was a scout for the Kansas City Royals in 2008. The Yokohama BayStars invited him to became their manager for the minor team in 2011, then promoted him to the majors and served as defense coach in 2012. He then came back to the Fighters and worked as defense coach from 2013 to 2015. He was also a coach for the Japan national baseball team that won the 2023 World Baseball Classic.

Overall, Shirai had hit .246/.332/.336 in 13 seasons in NPB.

Sources[edit]

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