Alex Rodriguez receives warm welcome in Tokyo, draws huge crowd as fans flock to get his autograph
Former New York Yankees shortstop Alex Rodriguez is often regarded as one of the best baseball players of all time. The New York native played 22 seasons in the big leagues. His most successful season came with the New York Yankees, where he won his one and only World Series. For his career as a whole, A-Rod has a .295 batting average, with 696 home runs and 2086 RBIs.
Just like the United States, Japan is also quite a baseball-mad country, having produced arguably the sport's biggest star at the moment, Shohei Ohtani, and numerous stars that have gone on to have successful major league careers in the past.
It was hence perhaps not really surprising to see the warm welcome that Japanese fans gave the Yankees legend, when he touched down in Tokyo shortly after midnight on Saturday (local time).
Right after landing, it appeared Rodriguez wasted no time in heading out to enjoy the sights and sounds of the city, posting a series of photos to his Instagram story as he took a tour of the city.
Alex Rodriguez reminisces on fantastic 2005 season
On Friday, popular New York Yankees Instagram blog page 'Yankees History' posted about Alex Rodriguez's remarkable 2005 season. With a .321 batting average, 1.031 OPS, 48 home runs and 130 RBIs in the regular season, A-Rod was deservedly named the AL MVP that year.
Rodriguez also later shared the post to his social media story, as he looked back at the amazing individual year he had.
Though on an individual level, Rodriguez excelled, the Yankees were ultimately unable to go as far as many expected in the postseason, after winning the AL East. The Bronx Bombers' campaign came to an untimely end as they lost 3-2 to the AL West champions, the Los Angeles Angels in the ALDS.