Yuichi Yanagisawa

Yuichi Yanagisawa (柳沢 裕一)

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 5' 11", Weight 162 lb.

• School Meiji University
• High School Matsusho Gakuen High School

• Born August 2, 1971 in Matsumoto, Nagano Japan

BR Register page

Biographical Information

Yuichi Yanagisawa was a backup catcher in Nippon Pro Baseball for over a decade.

Yanagisawa hit 20 homers in high school and had one 3-homer game in college. He made the Tokyo Big Six University League Best Nine three times. He was the MVP of the final phase of the 1993 Asian Championship, in which Japan won Gold. In the 1993 Intercontinental Cup, he hit .323/.500/.625 while playing DH, catcher and third base; at catcher, he backed up Hideaki Okubo, the 1993 Asian Championship All-Star C. Yuichi was a 2nd-round pick of the Yomiuri Giants in the 1993 NPB draft. He was 0 for 1 for the Giants in 1995. He was the backup to Shinichi Murata on the 1997 Giants, hitting .215/.269/.233 in 135 plate appearances over 57 games. He went 2 for 15 for Yomiuri over the next two seasons, then was traded to the Orix BlueWave for Takahide Itoh.

The Nagano native went 0 for 6 in 14 games in two years with Orix. He was traded to the Chunichi Dragons for Kosuke Yoshihara in 2001 and was 5 for 19. After going 0 for 5 in 2002, he hit .221/.277/.234 in 45 games the next year as the primary backup to Motonobu Tanishige. In 62 plate appearances and 38 games in 2004, he was again Tanishige's backup, hitting .242/.329/.339. He was 2 for 18 with 8 strikeouts in 2005 and was released the next year. He was the minor league battery coach for the Rakuten Golden Eagles from 2016 to 2018.

In 204 games and 360 plate appearances in Nippon Pro Baseball, Yanagisawa batted .209/.269/.238 with 67 hits.

Sources

• Japan Baseball Daily
• Wiki Japan