That Ichiro article

So, if you aren't living on another planet, or apparently even if you are, you're probably aware that Ichiro vented his spleen to some Japanese press recently about how he's a little unhappy with how much the Mariners sucked this year. Sadly, nobody seems to actually have an online version of the interview. I happened to buy Sports Graphic Number 640 last week because it's the big "BOBBY MAGIC! LOTTE PWN3D HANSHIN!" issue, and since I stayed up for most of the playoffs and Japan Series, I wanted the articles about it. Plus, it has the coolest picture ever, of Imae fielding Yano's popped-up bunt for a double play in the ninth inning of Game 4. That was just plain spectacular.

Now, see, all Japanese baseball magazines pretty much will always have Ichiro and Matsui sections. Most of the time I already know the information within, so I rarely bother reading them. So it's no surprise that I didn't even notice the "Ichiro: My Aim" article except that it had a funny picture with Ichiro in front of Safeco Field with approximately a hundred Japanese schoolchildren. No, really.

Well, as it turns out, this is one of the articles where Ichiro vented his spleen. So as a service to mankind (or maybe that's Marinerkind) I scanned in the article so other people could read it. And here you go. Because it was 5 pages long, I also scanned in a bonus picture of poor Kenji Johjima grumpily slouching on his couch with his catcher's mitt and his crutches. (It's the start of an interview article with him as well.)

The files are still up, just not image linked directly here any more:

Go here for small and large versions of files

Go here for Tokyo Sam's translation