Matsuzaka pitched, apparently!

Matsuzaka-mania is off and running after he made his first unofficial pitching appearance last night.  I thought I would point this out in case you hadn’t heard already.

The headline on MLB.com worries me a little, boldly stating that “Matsuzaka dominates BC in Sox debut”.   It bothers me because the BC they refer to are Boston College.  I’m sure this Boston College team contained a number of good young athletes and I don’t mean any disrespect, but wouldn’t any reasonable person expect Matsuzaka to dominate them?  Why is that the big story they are going with surrounding his first appearance?

I’m excited like everyone else at the prospect of seeing Matsuzaka pitch in the Majors.  I don’t support the Red Sox but I would love to see him have a great rookie season (except for his starts against the A’s of course).   By all accounts he’s a big talent and it’s a neat story for the Media to write about this Japanese star coming over to take on America, but give him a break.

The way some people are building him up, he’s going to have to get fifteen strikeouts (or more) and a win every time he pitches to avoid being a disappointment.  That’s completely unfair on the guy.  By all means get excited about him, but give him the chance to be great rather than burden him with the expectation of being super-human.

Maybe I’m being overly sensitive.  It’s standard British practice to build people up just so you can knock them back down again.  Hopefully that’s not the case with the treatment of Matsuzaka and it’s just people getting wrapped-up in the story.