It seems Hawaii Winter Baseball has helped teams in pennant races this past season on both sides of the Pacific Ocean.

Just as pitchers Joba Chamberlain and Ian Kennedy helped the New York Yankees reach the AL playoffs, pitcher Yusuke Kawasaki did the same for the Chiba Lotte Marines in Japan.

"We had four players here last year," Marines manager Bobby Valentine said. "One of them was Kawasaki, who saved my season this year. The hitters hit .178 against him during the season because he learned a new pitch when he was here. That's what put him over the hump."

Valentine is here not just to see the five players he has on the Honolulu Sharks. He also delivered the keynote address for the East West Sports Summit yesterday at the East-West Center at the University of Hawai'i.

Valentine said HWB was the perfect platform for a pitcher like Kawasaki to learn in a competitive environment.

"I wish there were 10 leagues like this for my players to play more because you can't teach experience," he said.

If it weren't for HWB, a player like Kawasaki, who was 1-1 with a 1.88 ERA with 35 strikeouts in 25 innings for the North Shore Honu last year, would have ended up in the Phoenix League in Japan, which he said is the equivalent of American instructional league. Kawasaki was 4-2 with a 1.65 ERA for the Marines.

The Marines, who finished second in the Central League to eventual Japan Series champion Nippon Ham Fighters, recently hired Hawai'i resident Lenn Sakata, who will manage the Marines' farm team starting next season.

"Lenn Sakata, in my mind, has always been one of the great baseball guys," Valentine said. "He's dedicated his life to where he's played it, learned it and can teach it. He's exactly what my organization needs: To have someone with his credential, enthusiasm and knowledge of the game."

During the summit, Valentine said Hawai'i would be the perfect venue for a true World Series between the U.S. and Japan. While weather would not be an obstacle, there is something else.

"MLB doesn't want to play anymore games, they don't want to lose any games," he said. "MLB doesn't want to initiate it so much. I say there's three facets: Ownership, players and fandom. If you ask all three of these groups, the fans and players would say yes. Ownership would say no. The players want to play for pride. The fans want the entertainment value. The owners want to play for money."

Valentine added that NPB is not taking advantage of the sport's popularity in Japan. He said the league should be able to negotiate a more lucrative television contract and should share in the revenue among the 12 teams. He said the money should enable NPB to retain most of the players who jump to MLB.

"No Japanese player wants to go live in Milwaukee, learn to eat their food, figure out how to drive on the other side of the road, learn a whole new league," Valentine said. "Nobody wakes up in the morning and says I want to do this, unless it's such a better situation in their mind."

Valentine played against and later for the Hawai'i Islanders during the 1970s.

INDIANS HERE

Although Castle graduate Reid Santos just completed his sixth season in the Cleveland farm system, he has yet to be placed on the 40-man roster, despite strong back-to-back seasons. He went 5-3 with a 2.72 ERA for Double-A Akron this past season and is currently pitching for the CaneFires in HWB.

Indians pitching coach Carl Willis said Santos shouldn't be disappointed.

Willis, here with other members of the Indians staff for an Elite Baseball Academy clinic (262-4538), said the Indians have been good about bringing along and trusting their prospects.

"Maybe it does make it tougher from an experience view point, but at the same time look at our bullpen," Willis said. "At the end of the year we had a kid, Jensen Lewis, who started the season at Double-A, didn't come to big-league spring training and was pitching in the playoffs and was one of our main bullpen guys."

Willis said he has seen Santos pitch in spring training so he knows the pitcher's capabilities.

"He's going in the right direction," Willis said.

ELSEWHERE

Name change: The Tampa Bay Devil Rays are gone. Trying to reinvent itself, the perennial last-place team officially shortened its nickname to simply "Rays" during a celebration that brought a crowd of about 7,000 to a downtown park last night. New team colors and uniforms also were unveiled during a fashion show. Navy blue and light blue have replaced green and black as the primary colors.

Reach Stacy Kaneshiro at skaneshiro@honoluluadvertiser.com.