January 16, 2023

By Evan Christie

Canadian Baseball Network

The 2012 Japan Series had many storylines surrounding it.

Both the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters and the Yomiuri Giants had taken very different roads to their pennants.

The Fighters had just lost Yu Darvish, the greatest pitcher in franchise history, and were coming off the sudden resignation of manager Masataka Nashida. In his place, new manager Hideki Kuriyama (current manager of the Japanese national team) had to mold a mix of young stars and veteran leaders to his vision, which was no small feat for a first-time manager.

On the opposite side, the Giants had just bounced back. After winning their 21st Japan Series title under Tatsunori Hara, the team had spent three years languishing as a third place squad, with many questioning Hara’s ability as a bench boss.

There were also two Canadians in play.

Now for the Fighters, that was no surprise. Reliever Dustin Molleken (Regina, Sask.) was the fifth Canadian to have suited up for the club, following in the footsteps of Edward Eishiro Yoshie (Vancouver, B.C.), Bob Alexander (Vancouver, B.C.), Rob Ducey (Cambridge, Ont.) and Nigel Wilson (Oshawa, Ont.). Despite only throwing 22 innings in the regular season, the Regina native was on the Fighters’ playoff roster, and it was well deserved.

While Molleken’s ERA and WHIP were average, he did put up an above-average FIP of 2.97, which was worth 87 ERA-.

On the other side, Scott Mathieson (Aldergrove, B.C.) was donning the orange and black of the venerable “Kyojin.” He was the second Canadian to do so after the aforementioned Yoshie, and the first in over 60 years. Mathieson was electric as the Giants’ backup closer. He put up a 1.71 ERA, a 1.79 FIP, and a sub-1 WHIP in 42 innings of work alongside regular closer Kentaro Nishimura. He and Nishimura helped form a super bullpen with Kyosuke Takagi (0.57 ERA), Yasunari Takagi (1.44), Satoshi Fukuda (1.61) and Tetsuya Yamaguchi (0.84).

While Molleken had been kept out of the Pacific League Climax Series (PLCS) by a back injury, Mathieson had been front and centre. He pitched in games 1, 3, 4 and 5 and did not give up a single run as the Giants fought tooth and nail with the Chunichi Dragons in the Central League Climax Series (CLCS), going all the way to six games.

(Sidenote, in the NPB playoffs, the better team automatically gets a one-game advantage. So the Giants only needed to win three games, while the Dragons needed to win four. The Japan Series doesn’t do this for obvious reasons.)

In four appearances, Mathieson hadn’t given up a single run. Because of this, he was exhausted, and not available to pitch in Game 1 of the Japan Series. So Molleken would have the honour of being the first Canadian to play in a Japan Series game when he stepped on the Tokyo Dome’s mound in the fifth inning.

After the Giants had put up a four-spot in the previous inning, it was Molleken’s job to blunt their momentum.

He couldn’t quite do it.

He did get Giants leadoff man Hisayoshi Chono to ground out to short, but up next came Takayuki Terauchi. On paper this should’ve been an easy matchup.

Terauchi had a grand total of seven extra-base hits that season, including the playoffs, and he’d struck out in both plate appearances so far. But to everyone’s surprise, he doubled down the line in left. Then the Giants star shortstop Hayato Sakamoto came up to the plate and drew a walk.

Then it was Shinnosuke Abe. The man widely regarded as the second-best catcher in NPB history hit a double to right field that scored both Terauchi and Sakamoto. It was now 6-0 Giants.

After Yoshinobu Takahashi singled, Molleken was lifted from the game.

If it’s any consolation, the Fighters never had a shot at winning the game, and they fell to the Giants 8-1.

Game 2 was Mathieson’s time to shine.

After starter Hirokazu Sawamura pitched eight brilliant innings, Tetsuya Yamaguchi was brought in to finish it off. Yamaguchi, a member of the aforementioned super-pen, was uncharacteristically shaky, giving up two two-out hits.

With the Giants only leading 1-0, they needed to shut this down as quickly as possible. Hara summoned Mathieson to do that job. On the first pitch of his outing, Tomohiro Nioka flew out to right.

So Mathieson became the first Canadian to register a save in the Japan Series, and he did so on just one pitch.

Games 3 and 4 would see neither Canadian compete.

With the series shifting back to the Fighters home city of Sapporo, they would take Game 3, 7-3, and Game 4, 1-0, with a 12th inning walk-off double from Yuji Iiyama, who’d only hit one extra base hit in the regular season.

In the final contest before the series shifted back to Tokyo, Molleken would again be summoned from the Fighters’ pen in an attempt to stop the bleeding. It was the sixth inning, and the Giants were winning 8-2. Such hopeless circumstances disguised what was a solid performance.

He struck out Sakamoto, got Shuichi Murata to fly out to right, and then got Kenji Yano to ground out to short for a 1-2-3 inning. Molleken would return to the field in the seventh, striking out Edgar Gonzalez, then getting John Bowker to ground out to short. Terauchi would once again get the better of him and single to centre, and third-string catcher Ken Kato would also single, but Molleken was able to put out the fire, getting Takahiro Suzuki to ground out to second.

I’d like to say this galvanized the Fighters to rally back from their six-run deficit, but no. The Giants would score two runs off Yuki Saito in the ninth and win 10-2.

So the series shifted back to Tokyo for Game 6, and with a 4-3 lead in the eighth, the Giants summoned Mathieson to shut down the heart of the Fighters’ order.

He would immediately get Sho Nakata to pop out and then strike out veteran star Atsunori Inaba. Eiichi Koyano would draw a walk, but pinch hitter Kenshi Sugiya would fly out to right to end any kind of momentum.

From there, Yamaguchi shut the Fighters down, and the Giants would take home their 22nd Japan Series title, and at the time of writing this, their last.

Molleken would only appear in five more games for the Fighters before being cut midway through the the 2013 season.

Meanwhile, Mathieson stayed on for the Giants for the rest of the decade, developing into an elite eighth inning man. He would have a brilliant Japan Series in 2013, not giving up a single run in four appearances as the Giants fell to Masahiro Tanaka’s Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles. He would lead the CL in holds in 2013 and 2016, the latter year earning him his only all-star appearance.

His scoreless Japan Series streak would end in Game 1 of the 2019 Japan Series, as he gave up a sac fly to Seiichi Uchikawa and was immediately lifted. That third of an inning would be his last in professional baseball.

The 2012 Japan Series was marked by blowouts and nailbiters, heroics and heartbreak, and at the centre of it all, two Canadian relievers pitching their hearts out to give their teams the best shot at winning.