If Kosuke Fukudome’s early struggles in spring training are anything to worry about, his presence in the club house definitely isn’t. Club houses of the good baseball teams are always a place of laughter and pranks, especially early in spring training. And Fukudome has found himself right in the middle of all the joking, from day one as note in the Sun-Sentinel.

When Kosuke first arrived at spring training last month, in his locker was not the ‘#1’ jersey he had worn at his signing day press conference, but a ‘#11’ jersey. A few minutes later Carlos Zambrano arrived and started getting dressed, but instead of putting on his big, ‘#38’ jersey, he was dressing in a slimmer, ‘#1” jersey. As the club house erupted in laughed, Kosuke gave a wide smile and shook his head.

Fukudome wasn’t going to let Big Z get the last laugh.

In spring training, players are given boxes of balls to autograph, usually a couple a week. One day after practice, Big Z returned to his locker to find a stack of 14 boxes to autograph. Fukudome has pushed his stack over to his locker neighbor. Big Z just pushed both of their stacks right back over, and this continued for a few days before the two just began signing the balls.

Others interacting with Kosuke:

Alfonso Soriano played minor league ball in Japan before being signed by the Yankees. Soriano is able to talk rather fluently with Kosuke on a day to day basis… Derek Lee spent some time growing up in Japan when we was younger but doesn’t remember much Japanese except a few basic phrases… And Kerry Wood has taken the time to learn how to greet his teammate every morning, learning ‘Good Morning’ in Japanese.

 Posted at: KosukFukudome.org