Valentine to set up Japan relief fund
Bobby Valentine, who used to manage Japan's Chiba Lotte Marines, said that it's possible that Chiba's stadium could sink into a nearby bay. Credit: AP
As with any American with ties to Japan, every day brings more reminders of the devastation there for Bobby Valentine, both in personal and baseball terms.
"The stadium I played in [in Chiba] is built on a landfill," the ESPN analyst said Wednesday. "The land now seems to be compromised. The entire stadium might sink into the bay."
And that is in an area relatively less devastated by the earthquake and tsunami.
Valentine said the Chiba Lotte Marines, the team he managed from 2004-2009, was scheduled to open next week against the Rakuten Golden Eagles, who play in the especially hard-hit city of Sendai.
"Obviously, that's been postponed," he said.
Valentine, the former Mets manager and newest member of ESPN's top announcing team, knows Japan as well as anyone in American sports. He was in contact with several dozen friends there within the first 48 hours after the earthquake struck last Friday.
"The impact is indescribable," he said. "It's horrific . . . Every day is a struggle."
Valentine plans to establish a relief fund, using ESPN's reach as a forum for raising money.
In his years in Chiba, Valentine said, he regularly heard from Japanese people who would talk to him about their sympathy for Americans in the wakes of the Sept. 11 attacks and Hurricane Katrina.
"I think there's a reciprocal feeling now from many people in the States watching what's happening in Japan," he said.
