Ichiro Suzuki Net Worth and Biography

Ichiro Suzuki mononymously known as Ichiro is a Japanese baseball outfielder, with an estimated net worth of $180 Million. He is the first Japanese-born position player to be posted and signed to an MLB club. He began his career at the  Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB), where he played for nine years, before joining the Major League Baseball (MLB),  for another 19 years.

Bio Data

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Biography

Ichiro Suzuki was born on 22 October 1973, he grew up in Toyoyama, a small town In Japan. He joined his first baseball team at the age of seven and asked his father to teach him to be a better player.  By age 12, he dedicated himself to pursuing a career in professional baseball and began training professionally.

Ichiro attended Aikodai Meiden, a Japanese  High School with a prestigious baseball program. He joined the school baseball team and was primarily used as a pitcher instead of as an outfielder. His cumulative high-school batting average was .505, with 19 home runs.

Despite his outstanding numbers in high school, Ichiro was not drafted until the fourth round of the NPB draft in November 1991, because many teams were discouraged by his small size.

Career

Ichiro made his NPB Pacific League debut in 1992 for the Orix BlueWave at the age of 18 but spent most of his first two seasons in the farm system because his then-manager, Shōzō Doi, refused to accept Ichiro’s unorthodox swing. He began to play every day in the second spot of the lineup and was eventually moved to the leadoff spot, benefitting from the arrival of a new manager, Akira Ōgi in 1994.

Playing on the lead spot off spot, Ichiro set a Japanese single-season record with 210 hits, becoming the first player ever to top 200 hits in a single season. In the same season, Ichiro had a  .385 batting average, the first of a record seven consecutive batting titles. He also hit 13 home runs and had 29 stolen bases, helping him to earn his first of three straight Pacific League MVP (Most Valuable Player) awards.

In 1995, Ichiro led the Blue Wave to its first Pacific League pennant in 12 years. In addition to his second batting title, he led the league with 80 RBI and 49 stolen bases, and 25 home runs. Following the 1996 season, playing in an exhibition series against a visiting team of Major League All-Stars kindled Ichiro’s desire to travel to the United States to play in the Major Leagues.

In November, Ichiro signed a three-year, $14 million contract with the Seattle Mariners, but was not allowed to play in the United States before 2001. After playing the first 12 years of his MLB career for the Mariners, Suzuki played two and a half seasons with the New York Yankees and three with the Miami Marlins. He played his final two seasons with the Mariners.

Honors and Accolades.

Ichiro received 17 consecutive selections both as an All-Star and Gold Glove winner in the NPB and MLB. He also won nine league batting titles and was named most valuable player (MVP) four times. In the NPB, he won seven consecutive batting titles and three consecutive Pacific League MVP Awards.

He was the first MLB player to enter the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame (The Golden Players Club). He was a ten-time MLB All-Star and won the 2007 All-Star Game MV

Suzuki also set a number of batting records, including MLB’s single-season record for hits with 262. He achieved 10 consecutive 200-hit seasons, the longest streak by any player in history.

In 2016, he notched the 3,000th hit of his MLB career, becoming only the 30th player ever to do so. He finished with 4,367 hits in his professional career across Japan and the United States, the most of any player in baseball history.

Ichiro Suzuki Net Worth

Ichiro Suzuki is one of the richest baseball players in the world, with an estimated net worth of $180 Million. He reportedly earned over $170 million in salary alone over his entire professional career and much more, from endorsement deals.

Over the course of his career, Ichiro has endorsed numerous Japanese brands, although he was more reluctant to enter endorsement deals with American companies. According to Forbes, at one point in his career, Ichiro earned roughly $7 million annually from endorsements, most of which came from Japanese companies.

He was the face of Kirin Brewery, a Japanese beer brand. He has endorsed Japanese brands such as sporting goods company Mizuno Corporation, Nikko Cordial, NTT Communications, and JXTG Nippon Oil & Energy. Ichiro also endorsed the Yunker energy drink on behalf of Sato Pharmaceutical.

As of 2001, Ichiro had deals with the US golf wear company Cutter & Buck, Upper Deck trading card company, and sporting goods company Majestic Athletic. Ichiro’s agent Tony Attanasio stated that Ichiro had rejected around $40 million in endorsements due to him being “very selective when it comes to putting his name out in public”