Chan Ho Park Was A Lot Better Than You Remember
Quick: who’s the winningest Asian-born pitcher in MLB history? You probably guessed Hideo Nomo. You’d be wrong! It’s not Masahiro Tanaka or Yu Darvish either. The answer is actually Chan Ho Park. Yes, that’s right:the guy known mostly for giving up two grand slams in the same inning to Fernando Tatis Sr.was actually a pretty good pitcher - and probably a lot better than you think.
Chan Ho Park was signed as an amateur free agent out of South Korea, and immediately caused a firestorm. AsSports Illustrated reportedat the time,
On St. Patrick’s day in Vero Beach, Fla., a 20-year-old pitcher from South Korea wearing a green Los Angeles Dodger cap (he had no idea what that was all about) rocked back from the pitching rubber, brought both hands high above his head and stopped, motionless as an oil painting. One, two, three, four, five seconds passed—an eternity charged with the tension of utter stillness. Suddenly he jerked his hands down, kicked his left leg above his head, drew back his right arm, thrust himself forward, brought his arm around as furiously as if he were cracking a whip and let loose another pitch toward…what, exactly? Recognition as a trans-cultural phenomenon? Or homogenization into the great American pastime?That might as well have been a flying saucer on the mound, the way the baseball establishment has reacted to Chan Ho Park and the unique method by which he sometimes delivers a baseball. No one knew what to do about it. No one wanted to touch it. It was just so—well, so foreign.* * *Park had wanted to play for the Dodgers ever since he visited the L.A. area for an amateur tournament in 1991. He saw a game at Dodger Stadium, bought a Dodger jacket and told a friend, “I’m going to be a Dodger.” As a pitcher for Hanyang University last year, he was scouted by the Dodgers at the Asian Games and the World University Games. They signed him in January [1994] for a $1.2 million bonus.
On St. Patrick’s day in Vero Beach, Fla., a 20-year-old pitcher from South Korea wearing a green Los Angeles Dodger cap (he had no idea what that was all about) rocked back from the pitching rubber, brought both hands high above his head and stopped, motionless as an oil painting. One, two, three, four, five seconds passed—an eternity charged with the tension of utter stillness. Suddenly he jerked his hands down, kicked his left leg above his head, drew back his right arm, thrust himself forward, brought his arm around as furiously as if he were cracking a whip and let loose another pitch toward…what, exactly? Recognition as a trans-cultural phenomenon? Or homogenization into the great American pastime?
That might as well have been a flying saucer on the mound, the way the baseball establishment has reacted to Chan Ho Park and the unique method by which he sometimes delivers a baseball. No one knew what to do about it. No one wanted to touch it. It was just so—well, so foreign.
Park had wanted to play for the Dodgers ever since he visited the L.A. area for an amateur tournament in 1991. He saw a game at Dodger Stadium, bought a Dodger jacket and told a friend, “I’m going to be a Dodger.” As a pitcher for Hanyang University last year, he was scouted by the Dodgers at the Asian Games and the World University Games. They signed him in January [1994] for a $1.2 million bonus.
As Park’s early success grew, so did the controversy, with questions surrounding whether his windup was even legal.Park was known to at times pause during his windup to play with a hitter’s timing - something Luis Tiant likewise did. Today, pitchers like Johnny Cueto, Masahiro Tanaka, and Yu Darvish routinely do the same, but MLB at the time allowed umpires to rule Park’s pause a balk anyway. Whether Park being the first Korean-born player in the major leagues played a role is impossible to know for sure, but it certainly didn’t help matters.
Park had a meteoric ascent to baseball’s highest level. He signed in the winter of 1994, spent Spring Training with the big club, and debuted as a 20-year-old reliever on April 8, making his major league debut before appearing in the minors. Park ended up spending most of the season at Double-A, where he dominated minor league hitters (8.9 K/9, 3.55 ERA) but too many walks at that level (5.1 BB/9) prevented him from getting extended run with the Dodgers. Los Angeles sent the young righty to Triple-A to start 1995, where he led the minors’ highest level in strikeout rate (8.3 K/9) and limited hard contact (just 7.6 H/9) but continued to struggle with walks (6.2 BB/9), leading to a bloated 4.91 ERA and 1.54 WHIP. Still, the Dodgers gave park an audition with his first MLB start on October 1, 1995; he flashed his swing-and-miss stuff with seven strikeouts in just four innings of work. That offseason,Park was rated the 41st-best prospect in baseball by Baseball America, between Todd Walker and Jason Schmidt, and ahead of a few guys you might have heard of named Scott Rolen, Andy Pettitte, and Bobby Abreu.
Pitch F/X and statcast weren’t around, of course, when Park first broke into the big leagues. Still,Baseball Almanac recordsthat Park was known as a power pitcher, with a high-octane upper-nineties fastball, curve, slider, and changeup. Matt Vasgersian compared the righty’s two-seam fastball to a video-game offering owing to its upper-echelon movement.
Park made the big leagues for good in 1996, achieving his dream of pitching a full season for the Dodgers. As a swingman (ten starts, seven games finished, 48 total appearances), Park tossed 108.2 innings, with a 3.64 ERA and an elite strikeout (24.9% K%, 9.86 K/9) rate, but walks (14.9% BB%, 5.88 BB/9) continued to be his bugaboo. Still, despite his success, a lead story of 1996 was whether Park would be required to serve in the South Korean military as required by law. Instead,Park was a member of the 1998 Asian games team that won gold, allowing him to continue the pitch in MLB instead of joining the military.
Park showed enough to earn a full-time rotation spot in 1997, and emerged as a two-fWAR starter. Although his ERA was shiny (3.38 ERA, 86 ERA-) and he finally cut back his walks somewhat (3.28 BB/9, 8.8% BB%), his vaunted strikeout rate fell precipitously (7.78 K/9, 21.0% K%), and his FIP (4.22, 102 FIP-) warned of trouble ahead. Still, his season was largely a successful one; he tied with Hideo Nomo for the team lead in victories (14) and, with Nomo and Ismael Valdez, formed the nucleus of a pitching staff throwing to future Hall of Famer Mike Piazza behind the plate. The Dodgers won 88 games in 1997, and looked poised to emerge as a perennial contender.
Of course, things didn’t turn out that way. The Dodgers traded away Piazza and Nomo, Valdez took a notable step back, and the Dodgers regressed to just 83 wins in 1998. Still, at the height of the steroid era, as Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa took aim at what was then Roger Maris’ single-season home run record, Chan Ho Park had one of the best seasons of his career in Los Angeles. Still just 25 years old, Park led the Dodgers in wins (15), innings (220.2), and starts (34), and his peripherals (20.2% K%, 7.8 K/9, 3.82 FIP) supported his 3.71 ERA (94 ERA-, 90 FIP-), and accrued 3.7 fWAR. Nonetheless, Park was shut out of the All-Star Game, and of that year’s Cy Young voting.
The Dodgers handed 34-year-old Kevin Brown a seven-year, $105-million contract that offseason to head their rotation, with the expectation that he would form a one-two punch with Park and return the team to contention. Hindsight is, of course, 20/20, but it seemed even at the time a curious move to deal away Piazza and Nomo only to sign the older Brown; the deal would have made more sense had Nomo and Piazza been kept around. Still, though Brown pitched like an ace in 1999, Park didn’t - and surprinsingly little of that had to dowith what happened with Fernando Tatis on April 23.
Let’s take a look at what happened in that fateful game. Park threw 87 pitches in just 2.2 innings, surrendering 11 runs on 8 hits with 3 walks and 2 hit batsmen. Granted, the Dodgers committed three errors behind Park, meaning that “just” 6 of those runs were earned, but it’s fair to say that Park didn’t at all have it that day and was left in far longer than he should have been. It’s also interesting to note that, for a while, at least, Park stabilized and very nearly salvaged his season. The very next time he pitched, against Milwaukee on April 28, Park surrendered two runs in 6.2 innings and struck out 6 without allowing a dinger. The start after that, he tossed seven shutout innings against the Expos. In fact, Park was actually quite good after his historic disaster through the end of May, going 3-1 with a 42:17 K:BB ratio and 3.52 ERA in 46 innings across seven starts.
Why do I pick the end of May? Because on June 5, Park’s first outing in June,this happened.Park was suspended for inciting the brawl by kicking Belcher. As it turns out,Belcher had evidently used a racial slur towards Park,but Belcher wasn’t disciplined. That’s really when the season went off the rails for Park; from June 17 - Park’s first start after the brawl - to the end of the season, Park surrendered 135 hits and 74 walks in 21 starts across just 123.2 innings, a 5.46 ERA. Opposing hitters teed off Park to the tune of a .282/.384/.468 batting line, with 30 doubles and 17 home runs. That all added up to a win probability added of -0.677, which is, well, atrocious. But it’s interesting to note that Park’s season was actually pretty good before June 5, even with the two-slam game included. It was the brawl, not Fernando Tatis, that began the tailspin which ruined his season. And whilst violence was not the answer, the ignored racism undoubtedly played a role in how Park’s season went down the tubes.
Park rebounded in 2000 and, across the next two seasons, enjoyed the best stretch of his career. Despite having become the answer to an unwanted trivia question (who’s the only pitcher to surrender two grand slams in the same inning?), Park was legitimately brilliant between 2000 and 2001. Across 70 games and 69 starts encompassing 460 innings, Park went 33-21 with a 3.38 ERA (122 ERA+), 435:215 K:BB ratio, and averaged 4 fWAR each season. Although he unjustly remained shut out of Cy Young voting, Park was named to his first All-Star Game in 2001.
The ace Chan Ho Park was here too late and gone too soon. Park received a five-year, $65 million contract from the Texas Rangers in free agency as part of the same offseason spending spree that brought in Alex Rodriguez on what was then the largest contract in professional sports history. But for Park, pitching in the brand-new, hitter friendly Ballpark at Arlington and facing designated hitters was a very different experience than the National League West. The 2002 Texas Rangers read like an All-Star team, with Park, Kenny Rogers, and old friend Ismael Valdez anchoring the pitching staff and an offense featuring free agent signee Rodriguez joining Hall of Famer Ivan Rodriguez as well as All-Stars Michael Young, Juan Gonzalez, Rafael Palmeiro, and Carl Everett. Still, the team won just 72 games and Park was injured and ineffective for most of the season.
It was the beginning of the end for Park, who as a fly ball pitcher never could figure out how to pitch in the Lone Star State. In three full seasons with the Rangers, Park allowed 136 walks and 293 hits in just 271 innings across only 48 starts, surrendering a whopping 47 home runs en route to a 5.85 ERA (5.68 FIP). He was dealt to San Diego for Phil Nevin shortly after winning his 100th game; San Diego agreed with him more than Texas, but by this point the 33-year-old was little more than an innings-eating mid-rotation starter. He spent the rest of his MLB career bouncing around as a reliever with the Mets, Phillies, and Yankees, among others, with his most successful stint in relief coming (where else?) with the Dodgers in 2008.
Park spent 2011 and 2012 in Asia, pitching with NPB’s Orix Buffaloes in 2011 and the KBO’s Hanwha Eagles in 2012, but didn’t distinguish himself with his performance at either stop. Still, despite his swift decline, it’s worth noting what Chan Ho Park did accomplish. He deserves more than being the answer to an ignominious trivia question. Despite breaking into the big leagues at age 20 and facing racism from players and the media, Park handled the pressure of being the first Korean-born player in MLB history - and did so with a flourish, becoming an All-Star and anchoring the rotation for a marquee franchise. He remains the winningest Asian-born pitcher in MLB history, with more wins than Hideo Nomo, Yu Darvish, Masahiro Tanaka, Daisuke Matsuzaka, Kenta Maeda, or Hiroki Kuroda. Given the caliber of those arms, Park’s feat is remarkable.