Shigetoshi Hasegawa watched his approach shot skip out of the rough and roll toward the hazard by the 18th green at Oak Creek Golf Club. It appeared that the former Angels reliever was looking at another bogey.
But then the ball stopped, safe and dry.
Hasegawa smiled sheepishly at his two playing players before chipping it close and finishing his U.S. Open qualifying bid with a birdie. Unfortunately, there weren’t enough of those on his card and he finished with a 77, or seven strokes shy of extending his major championship dreams.
The days of listening to Will Smith’s catchy “Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It” as he trotted to the mound at Angel Stadium are long gone, so Hasegawa, who pitched 442 innings with the Angels, has replaced that adrenaline rush with something a bit more tame … at least to some.
“Golf for me is exciting,” said Hasegawa, 46, who played five seasons for the Angels. “You get mad (at the high scores), but it is still fun. I’ve got to be excited about something just like I was about baseball.”
Hasegawa started to golf while with the Angels, often taking his clubs on road trips. Having an early wake-up call for a morning tee time gave him an excuse to pass on late-night clubbing invitations from other players. At that point golf was more of a hobby than an obsession, so he was a fairly high-handicapper. But the mental toughness required to pitch made him a better golfer, he said, because it taught him to have a short memory and not quit no matter the result.
“A bullpen guy can quit because the closer can come in,” Hasegawa said. “But I was a starter in Japan, so that is why I still have that mentality, and golf has the same mentality.”
Hasegawa didn’t get serious about golf until he ended his nine-year major league career after the 2005 season, when he pitched for Seattle. At that point he had no idea how to chip or hit out of a bunker so he went to the P Fit Golf Studio in Irvine to learn the basics from Shintaro Ishiyama.
Soon he was playing six days a week and became a near scratch golfer, but lately he has cut back to three or four days a week because he needs time to coach his Irvine-based PTC Mazda Scout youth baseball team.
“It is great working with the kids,” Hasegawa said. “They have so much potential. It is so much fun to teach.”
Angels manager Mike Scioscia has asked Hasegawa if he would like to teach or coach in the Angels’ system, but the former reliever said he isn’t looking for a full-time job in baseball again, partly because it would take him away from the golf course for too long. He would, however, consider a coaching position with the Angels if it were only during spring training or a part-time gig.
“I don’t need the money,” Hasegawa said.
But his golf game can always use some work. After all, U.S. Amateur qualifying is in July.
FYI
Shigetoshi Hasegawa played nine seasons in the majors, five with the Angels and four with Seattle. Here are some of his relief appearance statistics:
Games: 517
Innings: 720
Record: 45-33
Walks: 265
Strikeouts: 447
ERA: 3.70
