Rusian born baseball stars

[bambambaseball]

Besides for Victor Starffin and Eiji Sawamura, what other baseball stars have come out of Russia over the years?

[KCGHOST]

I never heard of these guys. They were both successful pitchers in Japanese baseball. Starffin was killed in a car wreck in 1951 at age 41. Sawamura enlisted in the Japanese Imperial Navy and subsequently was killed in action.

The only Russian players I know of who played in the majors were Jake Gettman, Rube Schauer, Bill Cristall, Izzy Goldstein, and Jake Livingstone. None of these guys were stars by any means.

[jalbright]

Bambam, I am rather certain Sawamura was Japanese, born in that country. Japanbaseballdaily lists his birthplace as: Birthplace: Ujiyamada, Mie Prefecture on this page: http://www.japanbaseballdaily.com/Pi...tomi-Seto.html You only have to scroll down a little to get to Sawamura.

Baseball-ref lists the MLB players born in Russia here: http://www.baseball-reference.com/bio/Russia_born.shtml

[bambambaseball]

I read somewhere that Sawamura's mother may have been Russian.

Thanks for the link. That's a good start, but I'm looking more for players who didn't necessarily play in the Majors but did play some level of professional baseball.

[Dalkowski110]

"I read somewhere that Sawamura's mother may have been Russian."

I really doubt that. Many of us forget the pervading racist attitude in Japan in the 1930's-1940's. I'm almost positive Sawamura was a commissioned officer in the Imperial Japanese Navy. Had he been such, he would've been 100% Japanese. While there was no written rule or edict that said you had to be such, it was one of those "unwritten agreements" where it just was not done (UNLESS you were serving in the Manchurian Army or other occupation army, but of course Sawamura was IJN).

[Mischa]

I read somewhere that Sawamura's mother may have been Russian.

Thanks for the link. That's a good start, but I'm looking more for players who didn't necessarily play in the Majors but did play some level of professional baseball.

There were a few Russian minor leaguers in the 1990s - Alexander Nizov (http://www.baseball-reference.com/bu...lexander_Nizov), Ilya Bogatyrev and a couple others who I can't recall off-hand. Bogatyrev was teammates with two other Russians in his first minor league season.

[Dalkowski110]

"Bogatyrev was teammates with two other Russians in his first minor league season."

LHP Rudy Razjigaev and 1B/3B/OF Euvgeny Puchkov.

[SDL]

Former Pirate RHP Victor Cole, who played for a month in the bigs during the 1991 season, was born in Leningrad in 1968 and was on the Russian National team in 2003 and 2007. Cole's father is actually from Sierra Leone.

[google]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koji_Ota

Koji Ota, one of the most popular players in Koshien ever is half Russian.

[bambambaseball]

Thanks for all the help on this.

[Mischa]

Former Pirate RHP Victor Cole, who played for a month in the bigs during the 1991 season, was born in Leningrad in 1968 and was on the Russian National team in 2003 and 2007. Cole's father is actually from Sierra Leone.

Since Cole was on the Russian team in '03 and '07, why didn't he pitch in the European Championship either year?

[SDL]

Since Cole was on the Russian team in '03 and '07, why didn't he pitch in the European Championship either year?

No idea. I know he was with the team in 2007, but was not on the roster for the Euro Championships in Barcelona.

[BlackRussian]

Since Cole was on the Russian team in '03 and '07, why didn't he pitch in the European Championship either year?

Because the rules stated that a player had to have a Russian Passport to play on the Russian team. Victor Cole did not want to give up his US citizenship just to get a Russian passport to play in a baseball tournament.