Alex Ramirez, With 2,000 Hits, Awaits Honor for Japanese Milestone TOKYO - When Carlos Beltran collected his 2,000th hit recently, the moment was greeted with polite but understandably low-key applause from around baseball; 269 players had reached the milestone before him. The real fanfare comes with 3,000 hits, a mark reached by only 28 players. In Japan, though, where the annual schedule historically has contained at least 10 percent fewer games, 2,000 hits is celebrated like 3,000 in the United States. Forty-one Japanese players have achieved the milestone, but when a Venezuelan joined them Thursday, it raised questions of how to honor the occasion. Alex Ramirez headed to Japan after the 2000 season as a 26-year-old outfielder after playing briefly for Cleveland and Pittsburgh. Unlike most players who have ventured across the Pacific Ocean, Ramirez stayed. Twelve seasons and three teams later, he has produced 2,000 career hits in the two nations. Ramirez, 37, reached the milestone with two hits on on Thursday, raising his career total in Japan to 1,914. Adding his 86 from the United States, he has 2,000 for his professional career. Recently, as more Japanese players have gone to the United States, such combined milestones have been reason to celebrate. In Ramirez's case, though, reaction was tempered. That is probably because he is so close to achieving the mark based solely on his hits in Japan. Going into the weekend, he needed 86 hits in his Yokohama DeNA Bay Stars" remaining 75 games to reach 2,000 in Japan. "I would like to get 2,000 hits in Japan," Ramirez said. I don't want to combine the two. Of course, I'm very happy with my hits in the States, but this is something that is very special in Japan, and I would like to keep it like that. The question of how, and even if, the combined mark would be recognized is largely in the hands of a private club. Such milestones in Japan are traditionally recognized by invitation to a society of Japan's elite players called the Meikyukai, or the Golden Players Club, and Ramirez is expected to eventually become the first Westerner to gain entry. It was created in 1978 by Masaichi Kaneda, Japanese baseball's most successful pitcher with 400 career wins. Admission is considered for three achievements: 2,000 hits, 200 wins and 250 saves. After leading the Meikyukai for many years, its stewardship recently passed to the home run king Sadaharu Oh. As a private club operating independently of Nippon Professional Baseball, the Meikyukai does not have to explain itself, and there are many quirks in its procedures. For instance, it does not recognize players born before the Showa Period, which began on Dec. 25, 1926. As a result, some of Japan's greatest players are not in the Meikyukai, including Victor Starffin, the only foreigner in Japan's Hall of Fame with 303 career wins, and Tetsuharu Kawakami, regarded as one of Japan's greatest batters with 2,351 career hits. Many people assert that it was Kaneda's longstanding rivalry with Kawakami that led to the birth date criterion; Kawakami was born on March 23, 1920. When Ramirez collects his next important hit, the Meikyukai again will be forced to confront his candidacy. A handful of foreigners - Warren Cromartie, Larry Parrish and Julio Franco among them - achieved 2,000 career hits with at least part of their total including hits in Japan. Cromartie's 951 hits in Japan are the most by any foreigner to have a combined 2,000. No Westerner in Japan, however, has reached the mark since the Meikyukai liberalized its criterion for admittance by allowing combined hit totals from Japan and the United States in 2003. The move occurred when it became obvious that Japan's national treasure Ichiro Suzuki would reach 2,000 after he left Japan for the Seattle Mariners. He was admitted in 2004. Kaneda even traveled to Yankee Stadium the day the former Yankee Hideki Matsui reached the combined milestone with a double to left field in 2007 so he could present him with a members" blazer complete with the Meikyukai crest at a postgame ceremony. The former Mets Kazuo Matsui, Hideo Nomo and Seattle's former closer Kazuhiro Sasaki are the other players who gained admission after their statistics from the United States were included. Even as Ramirez nears 2,000 hits in Japan, the Meikyukai does not list him on its Web site under coming accomplishments. It does list Japanese-born players who need more hits than Ramirez to reach 2,000. Although the issue may be thorny, ultimately, Ramirez is expected to gain admission. He is wildly popular and is affectionately known throughout Japanese baseball by fans and peers alike as Rami Chan, a combination of his surname and a title expressing closeness that is commonly attached to names in Japan. When he steps onto the field for pregame workouts, fans called out his name, and he typically returns their affection with a warm wave and big smile. The Rami Chan nickname also underscores the level of acceptance he has achieved in a homogeneous land. Indeed, Ramirez owns several records, including eight consecutive seasons of 100 or more runs batted in. That record was held by Oh. Ramirez was unsure how an outsider's pursuit would be received, but he said he was touched by the response. "I hit a three-run home run," Ramirez said of setting the record in a game in 2010 at Tokyo Dome. But let's not talk about the record, let's talk about who had it. Sadaharu Oh here in Japan, there is nobody higher in baseball. But people were happy about it, and that made me realize, Rami, you belong here in Japan. People really wanted you to break this record. "Oh San congratulated me and said: "If somebody was going to do that, it was you because of your style of play. I'm very happy what you did. It gave me chills when he say that. Ramirez's next chill may come at the presentation of the first Meikyukai blazer. A Meikyukai member, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to address the matter publicly, said: "Rami Chan absolutely deserves to be in simply based on the fact that nearly his entire performance will have been for the benefit of Japanese fans. I personally would welcome him with open arms and I can't imagine there will be any members who will feel differently. How can they? Ramirez would clearly be thrilled. "It would be an honor for me to be in the Meikyukai and represent all the Latin players and all the foreign players," he said. So many great players have been to baseball here and they haven't even got close to 2,000 hits, so for me to be able to be there, it's a real honor.