Ichiro Suzuki of the Seattle Mariners, on the other hand, has gained by playing. He raised his stature even more during the title game, when he drove in the first of Japan's four runs in the ninth inning.
"There was a wrong impression of Ichiro that he was sort of selfish," Oh said. "But as the people can see, he really committed himself to this team and he put so much time into this. Now he's one of the leaders of the team as well. I'm sure his popularity went up once again in Japan."
Later Sunday, I asked Alou and the former major league catcher Ozzie Virgil about Dominican players like Alex Rodriguez and Pedro Martinez, who chose not to play under the Dominican flag. (Rodriguez played for the US, where he was born; his parents are Dominican.)
"It's sad that some of our player making all the money have so many complaints," Virgil said, adding: "I felt their presence in the game -- without even playing. They could have given the Dominican players a boost."
Alou said he could detect a slight change in attitude among Dominicans. "You can compare these guys to soldiers of their countries," he said. "When they go out there to battle, they want their best soldiers to go. At least for the Dominican Republic, we didn't have that."
But the major adjustment has to come from Major League Baseball. There must be a change in how we refer to the October ritual when the best teams from the American League and the National League play a best-of-seven series.
Call it the Fall Classic, call it the MLB Championship. Just don't call it the World Series anymore.
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