With his two hit game on June 15, 2016, Miami Marlins outfielder, Ichiro Suzuki surpassed Pete Rose as the all-time hit king in professional baseball.
Surpassing Rose’s hit record is just one of the many incredible achievements of Suzuki in his long career that has spanned time in three decades and two continents.
Ichiro began his career at the age of 18 in 1992 with the Orix Blue Wave of the Japanese Pacific League. Ichiro had his coming out party in his third season in which he played 130 games and accumulated 210 hits. Ichiro would continue racking up hits with the Blue Wave for the next six seasons until he signed with the Seattle Mariners of Major League Baseball. In his nine seasons in Japan, Ichiro accumulated 1.278 total hits.
Upon making the trip across the Pacific, Ichiro immediately made his presence known in the MLB. In his first season with the Mariners he led the league in plate appearances, at bats, hits and stolen bases. In his first 11 season, Ichiro would go on to lead the league in at bats eight times.
After spending his whole US career with Seattle, Ichiro was traded to the New York Yankees in the 2012 season. After three years in the Bronx, he then signed with the Miami Marlins in the winter of 2015.
At 42, Ichiro is cementing his legacy as one of the greatest hitters in the history of the game. Over his 24-year career, he has set five world records as recorded by the Guinness Book of World Records.
In 2004, he set the world record and major league record for most hits in a single season with 262. He broke the record of George Sinser who had 257 hits in the 1920 season.
From 2001 to 2010, Ichrio collected over 200 hits in each season. In those ten season, Ichiro collected a total of 2,244 hits. As well as leading the league in hits seven times over those ten years, Ichiro was an All-Star every year over that span.
Ichiro’s time as a perennial All-Star also allowed him to set another world record. In the 2007 All-Star game at the spacious AT&T Park in San Francisco, Ichrio became the first player to ever hit an inside the park home run at the Mid-Summer Classic.
His next world record is shared with the man he unseated as the professional hit king of the world. Ichiro Suzuki and Pete Rose lead the world with ten seasons of 200+ hits. All of Ichiro’s 200+ hit seasons came in his historic ten season run. Rose’s ten 200+ hit season’s came in 1965-66, 1968-70, 1973, 1975-77 and 1979.
His final record is the most controversial of his five and it’s his all-time hits record. On June 15, the Guinness Book of World records recognized Ichiro as the all-time hit leader in professional baseball history with 4,257. This record has been 24 years in the making and is truly an incredible achievement by one of the greatest hitters of all time.
Whether or not you believe that Ichiro is truly the all-time hit king, or it is still Pete Rose, you cannot contest the astonishing nature of his achievement.
Ichiro is signed through the end of this season with a club option for 2017. His future in Major League Baseball is uncertain. His legacy is intact however. He will go down as one of the hardest outs to get and best hitters of all time regardless of how he ends his career.