Matt Randel

Matthew Randel

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 6' 0", Weight 180 lb.

• School Lewis-Clark State College
• High School Ridgefield (WA) High School

• Born February 15, 1977 in Washington, DC USA

Matt Randel is a highly unusual American pitcher in that over 80% of his baseball career has been in Asia.

Randel was an 84th-round pick of the Los Angeles Dodgers in the 1995 amateur draft. He went on to college instead of signing, but dropped out. He got his big break in 1999 when he tried out for the Daiei Hawks and was signed. He allowed hits to 2 of the 3 batters he faced for Daiei in 2000.

Randel next was picked up by the Fort Worth Cats, going 4-5 with a 3.05 ERA in 2002. Had he qualified, he would have been among the Central Baseball League leaders in ERA.

The Yomiuri Giants signed Randel after his stint in Texas and he was 1-1 with a 7.71 ERA in 3 games for them in 2003. The next year, the 27-year-old was 3-2 with a save and a 5.45 ERA in 24 games, his busiest season in Japan. He did strike out 42 batters in 39 2/3 innings.

After leaving Japan, Randel caught on with the Doosan Bears of South Korea. He debuted in the Korea Baseball Organization in 2005 with a 12-7, 3.25 record despite allowing 163 hits in 149 2/3 IP. In 2006, the Doosan hurler posted a 16-8, 2.95 record.

In 2007, Matt went 12-8 with a 3.12 ERA. He tied Myung-hwan Park for 5th in the league in ERA and tied Jamie Brown for 5th in wins. He fell to 9-9, 4.48 in 2008 but beat Kwang-hyun Kim in the first game of the 2008 Korean Series, outdueling the top regular-season hurler in the KBO.

Sources

• Japan Baseball Daily by Gary Garland
• SABR minor league database
• KBO Player Page
• Korean Wikipedia entry