TORONTO – A legitimate opportunity to play and stick in the majors seemed to finally arrive for Jamie Romak on Aug. 8, 2015, when the Arizona Diamondbacks cleared a roster spot for him by trading Cliff Pennington to the Toronto Blue Jays.
A hard-hitting infielder and outfielder from London, Ont., he’d been grinding in the minors for 12 years at that point, enjoying only a brief 15-game stay with the Los Angeles Dodgers the previous year. The Diamondbacks were his sixth big-league organization and when he was recalled from triple-A Reno, he thought they were ready to put him on a major-league track.
“They called and — I can remember vividly — said, ‘This is your shot. You’ve got the next two months with the team. You can carve out your role,’” Romak recalls. “What more can you ask for as a player than to finally get an extended shot?”
One week and 10 plate appearances over six games later, the Diamondbacks optioned Romak back to Reno when an exhausted bullpen needed reinforcements. Once he returned in September, he got six more plate appearances over six games and the pathway to opportunity had closed off as suddenly as it had opened.
“It was just very striking to me at that time, like this is not going to be a fit for the sort of player that I am, the up and down and the minimal opportunities,” he says. “If I wanted to have an extended career, which I think I’m capable of, I just thought it would be better in Asia.”
The next year Romak ended up in Japan as a member of the Yokohama Bay Stars, putting in motion the chain of events that have allowed him to emerge as a star in the Korean Baseball Organization with SK Wyverns, which was renamed SSG Landers this season. Away from the North American spotlight, he’s fully capitalized on the opportunity to have the type of career he’d long sought, and his achievements will be recognized when he’s presented with the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame’s 2020 Tip O’Neill award in a pre-game ceremony Thursday.
With COVID-19 restrictions preventing travel Michael Danagher, Canada’s ambassador to South Korea, will hand over a commemorative plate — the trophy itself, housed at the museum in St. Marys, Ont., is too large to transport overseas — in a unique Canada Day celebration.
“It will be really cool,” says Romak. “I’m really, really appreciative of all the work that people have done. I’m going to have to apologize to my teammates for having to stand up there and go through this. I’m sure I’ll hear about it from them. The fact that my family’s here and we can do it on Canada Day, there’s plenty of Canadian expats in the area that are that are big fans of us that come to the games, it’ll be just an awesome day all around.”
The Tip O’Neill Award is given annually to the Canadian player “judged to have excelled in individual achievement and team contribution while adhering to baseball’s highest ideals,” an honour typically reserved for the top Canuck in the majors, but justly given to Romak here.
Last year, separated from wife Kristin and sons Nash, 4, and Pierce, 1 by the pandemic, he hit .282/.399/.546 with 32 homers and 91 RBIs in 139 games. It was his fourth straight elite impact season in the KBO and not that far from his brilliant 2018, when he had an OPS of 1.001 with 43 homers and 107 RBIs en route to a title.
Strong performances by Canadians overseas tend to get overlooked — Scott Mathieson, for instance, had a monster career as the closer for the Yomiuri Giants while lefty Andrew Albers logged three quality years for the Orix Buffaloes. But the KBO became a focal point when it resumed play while North America remained in lockdown, helping Romak earn some deserved acknowledgement.
“It was great to show sports fans that high-level baseball exists outside of the major leagues,” he says. “When I originally came here, I was on the major-league roster and accepted a contract to go to Japan and people had trouble understanding that. Why would you ever do that? Don’t get me wrong, (MLB) is the best league in the world. But Japan and Korea, however you want to look at it, whether it’s the salaries, the quality of play, the lifestyle, the perks, whatever you’re after, it offers that major-league quality of life. And I think this kind of is shining a little bit of a light on it.
“I’m really appreciative that they thought of me. I live 45 minutes from St. Marys. I grew up close by and played on those diamonds. As a player during your career, I don’t think it really sinks in. But one day to be able to take my family up there and show them that my name’s on that plaque beside all these guys that were just phenomenal baseball players, that’ll be just a tremendous feeling.”
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Succeeding in Asian baseball isn’t easy.
Acclimating to overseas life can be a challenge for some, but Romak has settled nicely living in Incheon’s Songdo international business district. There’s a large expat community of Canadians there that eases the isolation and loneliness he sometimes experiences at the ballpark, and his family is with him this year, with Nash attending an international kindergarten.
“I get up and walk him to school in the morning and I tell him, ‘Dude, this is my favourite part of the day right now,’” says Romak.
Most of the creature comforts from home can be found in Songdo, although “I like eating deli sandwiches and there are no deli sandwiches here,” he says. He misses little pieces of normalcy from London life like mowing the lawn and fixing things around the house.
Then there are the baseball pressures, which are also very different.
“This culture is very outcome based,” he explains. “There’s not a lot of emphasis on the process. You either did or you didn’t, which can be tough in baseball, because no matter how good you are, you go through cycles that whether you don’t get pitches to hit, or you hit them at guys, it doesn’t always go your way. A lot of the challenge here can be managing those expectations and people around you. When everyone else is panicking, can you stay calm and stay the course?”
Invariably, Romak has done just that.
This year, he’s batting .243/.354/.485 through 66 games with 17 homers and 43 RBIs, working through some terrible BABIP luck. Still, at 35, in his 19th year of pro ball, he’s in a place where he can see the bigger picture, relish every moment and be grateful for “the opportunity to play every day on that bigger stage and have control of my own destiny and career.”
Coming to Asia “certainly wasn’t one of those, ‘Hey, I’m looking for an adventure, I’m looking at the end of my career, I’d like to make a little bit of money,’” he adds. “It was like I want to have a career. I want to start my career. That’s what it represented to me. That mindset helped a lot and I think that’s why I’ve been able to have success.”
Success that will be feted in a once-in-a-lifetime Canada Day at Incheon SSG Landers Field.
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