LOS ANGELES (AFP) ? Hideki Irabu, a retired Japanese star pitcher who spent six years in North American Major League Baseball, has been found dead in his suburban home of an apparent suicide, police said. He was 42.
Mike Arriaga, a sergeant with the Los Angeles County sheriff's department, said Thursday that Irabu was found dead on Wednesday afternoon at his home in Rancho Palos Verdes of what appeared to be suicide.
No other details were released as authorities continued to investigate the death of Irabu, who played for two World Series-winning New York Yankees teams.
Ed Winter of the Los Angeles County coroner's office said Irabu's body was found by a friend and authorities were notified.
Winter said the coroner's office was not releasing any circumstances of the death other than it was being investigated as a suicide.
Irabu was a combined 34-35 with a 5.15 earned-run average in 126 games, 80 as a starter, over six Major League Baseball seasons playing for the Yankees, Montreal Expos and Texas Rangers before his retirement in 2002.
After a notable career in his homeland, Irabu inked a $12.8 million contract to make the jump to America in 1997.
He joined the Yankees amid great fanfare and helped the fabled club win World Series crowns in 1998 and 1999.
When he first took the mound for the Yankees on July 10, 1997, the event drew 300 reporters, including about 100 from his homeland.
He walked four and struck out nine in six and 2/3 innings and left to a standing ovation as the Yankees defeated Detroit 10-3.
However, he never really flourished in New York. Irabu made a combined 55 regular-season starts for the 1998 and '99 champions but never pitched for them in a World Series.
Irabu's best Major League Baseball season was 1998, when he started 28 games. He pitched 173 innings, including two complete games, notching 13 wins with an ERA of 4.06.
He also had his detractors during his stint with the Yankees, provoking criticism with some boorish behavior off the field and drawing the ire of fabled Yankees owner George Steinbrenner -- who once famously called Irabu a "fat toad" for failing to cover first base on a ground ball in a spring training game.
Steinbrenner later apologized.
The Yankees sent Irabu to Montreal before the 2000 season. He played two years for the Canadian club and another in Texas. He retired in 2004 after a season back in Japan with the Hanshin Tigers.
Since retiring from baseball, Irabu has been involved in alcohol-related brushes with the law.
On August 20, 2008, he was arrested at a bar in Osaka for allegedly attacking the manager and wreaking havoc after his credit card wasn't accepted.
On May 17 of 2010, Irabu was arrested on suspicion of drunk driving in the Los Angeles suburb of Redondo Beach.
Although Irabu's Yankees career never lived up to expectations -- the club's or even perhaps his own -- his agent, Don Nomura, told the New York Times in 2008 that the player had no regrets.
"He had some bad days when he played," Nomura told the newspaper. "He also had some great days.
"That was his lifetime dream -- to go to the Yankees."
Former major league manager Bobby Valentine, now an ESPN broadcaster, managed Irabu in Japan in 1995.
"He was a world-class pitcher," Valentine said. "There were just some days when he was as good a pitcher as I had ever seen. A fabulous arm."
Valentine also noted that Irabu, like Hideo Nomo, helped pave the way for other Japanese stars such as Ichiro Suzuki and Hideki Matsui to break into the US big leagues.
"He was one of the pioneers," Valentine said. "There was a lot riding on his shoulders."
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