Kosuke--You may have made a terrible mistake

When Kosuke Fukudome first signed with the Cubs, I was a little worried that Chicago, historically one of the more segregated and racially insensitive major cities in the U.S., would not treat his arrival with the tact and maturity expected of human adults--especially playing in front of what is collectively one of the more obnoxious fanbases in sports.

Of course, those worries have proven resoundingly justified. I guess with the combination of being the first Japanese-born player to play for the Cubs and having a last name that kinda sorta sounds like a naughty word, some grade-A crassness was an inevitability. And that's not to say I'm totally innocent.

Having said that, I'd like to think that among our few readers, there's a mutual understanding that none of us think of foreign-born players as novelties, but as fellow intelligent human beings who are to be regarded for their personal qualities and talents. The same can't necessarily be said of a big-budget radio station that reaches people of all demographics within a sixty-mile radius of Chicago.

So I was a little bothered by a sweeper I heard earlier on WJMK (the same radio station that caused a minor ruckus a few months back with Steve Dahl's "Win a date with Drew Peterson" gag). It went something like:

"We're still trying to figure out how to say the Cubs' new Japanese player's last name without getting in trouble with the FCC."

Maybe I'm reading too much into something that's entirely harmless. But I'm gonna guess that no one from the WJMK marketing department spoke to Kosuke to see if he was cool with that. And if I can speculate some more, I'd guess that Kosuke is still struggling to adjust to Chicago and the challenge of finding people he can relate to as he goes about his daily business. On top of that, he doesn't need to put up with publicly being made a punchline and a novelty among a circle that knows nothing about him outside of baseball.

Maybe Kosuke would have had to deal with this crap no matter where he signed, and maybe the more innocent stuff like "You got Fuked!" doesn't bother him. But it also might. At the very least, I don't think any person in any job or any club wants to be recognized principally as "the Japanese guy" or "the chick" or "the old dude." And the more singularly you possess that trait, the more it must suck.