The first two games of the season, Kuniyoshi Kato registered one hit in eight official at bats, good for a paltry .125 average.  LRS pitchers can be forgiven for wishing the Cliff Hanger right fielder had just called it a season right there.  He cracked two hits the next game, hasn’t cooled down since, and as of this writing his average stands at .362, easily best in the Bright Blade Group.

“I take full blame for Kato’s season,” said a laughing Kuniaki Matsumoto, the Fushigi Yugi pitcher on the mound that day.  “Maybe if I had struck him out a few times,things would be different.”

Of course, striking Kato out has proven to be difficult to achieve.  The 25-year-old outfielder appears to be hitting his true stride this year, and that true stride means, as teammate Stadatake Sato said, “he’s just flat-out hitting.”  How flat-out?  He’s at a .326 mark with two strikes.  .374 in the leadoff slot.  .429 when ahead in the count, and with runners in scoring position. .385 in close or late games.  .400 in extra innings.  .401 in daylight, and a paltry .341 under the moon.  He’s at .354 at home, .371 on the road.  His month-by-month splits are .354, .460. .328, .356, .348–“nearly flat as a dead man’s heartbeat,” as one radio announcer infamously quipped.

And he’s not a dinker-dunker out there, either.  He’s drilled 11 homers, collected 29 doubles, and driven in 64 runs while slugging .516 to go with his .441 OBP.  In other words, ladies and gentlemen followers of the Lupin Cliff Hanger baseball club, Kuniyoshi Kato is quietly turning in a remarkable, career-defining season.  Wanna talk about why Lupin has scored 42 more runs than group rival Naha, despite Naha’s remarkable 51 home-run lead over Lupin?  We’re figuring Kato’s performance (along with #2 hitter Shiro Adachi‘s steady OBP) goes a long way to answer the question.

“You could see it coming,” Adachi said before the last game.  “Kuniyoshi always had the sweet swing, even when he was struggling in his first couple seasons in Cagliostro.  So you knew it was just a matter of time.  He came straight out of secondary school, after all.  Life is tough when you’re playing ball at 18.  Proof of this assessment can be seen in Kato’s high school records, where he won many accolades with the bat, but it wasn’t until his fourth season as a professional baseball player that he hit his stride with a season split between the big club (where he hit .325) and Lupin’s Yamauchi (MD) club (where he hit .343).  He was 21, and the world was his. 

While the next three seasons were solid, none matched the sizzle of expectation he had created, and by the beginning of this year you could hear whispers among the team’s front office.  Had Kato peaked?  Was he done progressing?  “There was some discussion of even going out on the free agent market to finding another guy,” GM Ron Collins said.  “But Tamotsu (Scouting Director, Tamotsu Yoshida) was very clear that he thought we should wait another season.  When Mamoru (Hitting Coach, Mamoru Shimada) agreed with him, we pretty much just shut those talks down.”

Kato himself is a bit defensive about his results this season.  “I don’t feel like I’m doing anything differently,” he said.  “It’s not like the ball looks any bigger coming to the plate.”  Which is all good and well, and reads well in the papers, but the fact is that there’s been a quantum step upward in the young man’s approach.  While he’s never struck out much, Kato’s plate discipline has been suspect in the past.  His walk-rate has risen.  His doubles are up.  And, perhaps an even better indicator that he’s become a true student of the game can be seen in his more silent improved fielding numbers (he’s in process of posting +ZR in both corner outfield slots for the first time in his career).

Will it carry on?  Has Kato turned the corner at age 25?  Well, the past is gone and the future is not promised.  Whatever happens from here on out, it’s clear that Kuniyoshi Kato’s present is pretty danged good.