Call him the Shigeki Maruyama of Japanese baseball, with a little Tony Robbins thrown in for good measure.

Win, lose or -- in Japan, anyway -- draw, homer, whiff or single, you'll rarely catch Yakult Swallows outfielder Alex Ramirez with a scowl on his face.

"This is just a game," Ramirez said last week during the Swallows-Giants series at Tokyo's Jingu Stadium. "One day you're here, the next day you don't know where you're going to be. You've just got to stay positive about everything, whether you're in a slump or not. It all reflects on you and what your teammates think about you."