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Yankees legend pays tribute to recent Hall members CC Sabathia and Ichiro Suzuki

Yankees legend pays tribute to recent Hall members CC Sabathia and Ichiro Suzuki

yankees Legend Hideki Matsui played seven seasons for the Yankees. It wasn’t until his last one, in 2009, with the addition of left-handed ace CC Sabathia, that he managed to get that elusive World Series ring.

On Wednesday, after learning that Sabathia had been inducted into the National Baseball Hall of FameMatsui released a statement in honor of his former teammate.

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This is what he said, via Bryan Hoch of MLB.com:

“CC: congratulations on your election to the Hall of Fame. You were a great ace pitcher, a great teammate and truly a wonderful human being. Before you came to the Yankees, I played against you many times and couldn’t come close to your pitches. So when you came to the Yankees, you have no idea how happy and relieved I was to not have to face you anymore. Congratulations again on a truly great and historic career.”

Matsui didn’t stop there. He then honored his compatriot Ichiro Suzuki, who paved the way for Japanese players in many ways.

There were certainly Japanese players before Suzuki, but Suzuki opened the doors to a wave of players who would change MLB forever.

Before Suzuki, there were good players like pitchers Shigetoshi Hasegawa and Hideo Nomo. After Suzuki, there was Matsui, Yu Darvish, Masahiro Tanaka, and arguably the greatest of all time, Shohei Ohtani.

Here’s what Matsui had to say about Suzuki, via Hoch:

“Ichiro-san, congratulations on your induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame in the USA. I think this is also a historic day for baseball in Japan. I feel that your career has been one in which you have achieved the greatest results and achievements possible by following your own philosophy and not being limited by conventional baseball wisdom. It has truly been an honor and pleasure to have been able to play during the same period as you, both in Japan and in Major League Baseball.