Tadao Wako

Tadao Wako (若生 忠男) known as Tadayasu Wako in 1970

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 5' 11", Weight 171 lb.

• High School Tohoku High School

• Born September 22, 1936 in Sendai, Miyagi Japan
• Died 1998

BR register page

Biographical Information

Tadao Wako won over 100 games in Nippon Pro Baseball but never made an All-Star team. He is apparently unrelated to contemporary Tomoo Wako, who was born in the same city seven months off and went to the same high school!

Tadao debuted for the Nishitetsu Lions in 1955 but the teenager had a 6.28 ERA in ten outings; he did fan 16 in 14 1/3 IP. He improved his ERA to 2.86 in 1956, though he went 0-2. He again had more strikeouts (37) than IP (34 2/3). He became a regular in 1957, completing 12 of 19 starts and relieving 25 times. He was 9-11 with a 2.20 ERA, allowing only 118 hits in 163 1/3 innings though he walked 80. Had he qualified, he would have been 6th in the Pacific League in ERA (between Noboru Makino and Hisafumi Kawamura). He was 6th in K (135, between the same two hurlers) and 5th in walks (between Tetsuya Yoneda and Kazuhisa Inao). He started Game 5 of the 1957 Japan Series against the Yomiuri Giants' Takehiko Bessho and allowed one run in four before Kyoji Nishihara took over with the game tied; Nishitetsu won the game to lock up the Series.

In 1958, he had a 5-5, 3.43 record. He was 9th in the league in walks (59, between Shoichi Ono and Atsushi Aramaki) and was second with 12 batters plunked (one behind Tadashi Sugiura). He allowed two runs in one inning of Game 1 after relieving Kawamura; Takayuki Hata finished off the loss but Nishitetsu won the Series again. He had similar results in 1959 at 6-6, 3.29. He had his most wins in a season in 1960, going 13-7 with a 2.49 ERA. Had he qualified, he would have been 7th in ERA (between Joe Stanka and Takao Kajimoto). He tied Glenn Mickens and Tomoo Wako for 8th in wins, while his four shutouts were one behind leader Ono.

The submarine hurler was 9-8 with a 2.82 ERA in 41 games (26 starts) in 1961. He made leaderboards for complete games (5, tied for 10th), shutouts (4, 4th), walks (55, tied Dick DeSa for 10th) and hit batsmen (11, 1st, one ahead of Sugiura). During 1962, he was 14-19 with a 2.42 ERA in a workhorse 56 games (33 starts, 12 complete) and 286 innings for the Lions. He was 5th in ERA (between Masayuki Dobashi and Yukio Ozaki) , tied Kajimoto and Sugiura for 10th in wins, 3rd in losses (behind Tsutomu Kuroda and Yukihiro Kubo), tied Chikara Morinaka for 7th in appearances, second in starts (two behind Stanka), tied Kajimoto for 3rd in complete games, tied for 7th in whitewashes (2), trailed only Inao and Kubo in innings, tied DeSa for 3rd in walks, trailed only Yoneda and Inao in whiffs (207), led in ties (3) and again hit the most batters (17, 6 more than Mickens).

The veteran was still only 26 years old when the 1963 season began. He still pitched a lot, though down a bit (51 G, 23 GS, 5 CG, 202 2/3 IP) from the prior year. He had a 12-12, 2.31 record. Had he qualified (given that workload, he presumably came close), he would have won the ERA title, .05 ahead of Kubo. His 86 walks were third behind Ono and Yoneda, he tied Shigemasa Yamamoto and Morinaka for 6th in hit batters (9) and he tied Ono for the most wild pitches (6). The Lions returned to the Japan Series for the first time in five years but he only appeared in one of the seven games, giving up 5 runs (4 earned) in 4 innings as part of a Game 2 blowout as this time they fell to Yomiuri. He fell to 5-5, 4.56 in 1964. He again plunked the most (11) despite the reduced time on the hill (134 1/3 IP).

The Sendai native rebounded to 8-5 with a 3.02 ERA in 1965 and was showcasing better control, walking 35 in 122 innings. In 1966, he was a stellar 12-3 with a 1.53 ERA and .67 WHIP in 117 1/3 innings. He again would have led in ERA had he qualified. He no-hit the Hankyu Braves on September 17, 1967. For that season, he was 5-9 despite a 2.82 ERA. He reached 100 career wins during 1968 but had a rocky 4-12, 3.26 record.

Transferring to Yomiuri, he was 3-3 with a 3.01 ERA in 23 games in 1969, his lowest workload since he was a teen. He allowed only one run in seven over three outings in the 1969 Japan Series as the Giants topped the Braves, giving him three Series titles. He pitched two shutout innings in 1970 to end his playing career. He then was an announcer for three different TV stations as well as spending one year as pitching coach of the Lotte Orions.

Overall, he had been 105-107 with a 2.81 ERA in 578 games (225 starts) in NPB. Through 2023, he was tied for 100th all-time in NPB in shutouts (17), tied Jun Aramaki for 90th in losses, 96th in innings (1,973 1/3, between Kunio Jonouchi and Genji Kaku), 65th in walks (676), tied for 17th in hit batsmen (100, even with Kazuhisa Ishii and Yuki Nishi), 64th in K (1,459, between Hiroki Kuroda and Tatsuo Komatsu) and tied for 87th in wild pitches (40).