Sad news came across last week about the death of Clete Boyer, the New York Yankees' slick-fielding third baseman from the glory days of the early 1960s. Most obituaries failed to mention that Boyer, who died June 4 in Atlanta at the age of 70, ended his playing career in Japan with the then-Taiyo Whales in 1975.
Boyer was one of the first ballplayers I met in Japan, although he had retired and was a coach with the Whales when we first shook hands in 1976 at the old Kawasaki Stadium, that bandbox of a ballpark wedged between a race track and neighborhood housing about a 12 minute walk from JR Kawasaki Station, halfway to Yokohama from Shinagawa in Tokyo.
Those were the days when the 12 Japanese pro teams were allowed two foreign players per organization — period. Boyer, following a 17-year major league career with the Kansas City Athletics, the Yankees and the Atlanta Braves, joined the Taiyo club with second baseman Johnny Sipin in 1972.