It’s been a minute since Ichiro Suzuki was in his prime with the Seattle Mariners, so let’s do some guided meditation on what it was like to behold him at the best of those times.Close your eyes. Take a deep breath. Think of the ocean or whatever. Let your mind drift to a point in time between 2001 and 2012. Let the imagery come into focus. There’s Ichiro in the outfield, gliding gracefully across the grass and unleashing throws the likes of which probably still fill Terrence Long’s nightmares. There’s Ichiro on the basepaths, moving fast enough to make 90 feet look like 90 inches. And there’s Ichiro in the batter’s box, using that funky swing to produce divine results.First MLB hit ➡️ 3,000th MLB hit for Ichiro 👏 pic.twitter.com/zxK6wp4IqF— MLB (@MLB) January 22, 2025If you now have a smile on your face, congratulations. You’re a Mariner fan who is keeping the joy of Ichiro’s prime alive. You’re doing the fandom a service, as a good sa-Mariner-tan should.But in case you’ve wondered what it was like to have to face Ichiro in his prime, Brandon Beachy’s recent story for MLB Trade Rumors is well worth a read.That time Brandon Beachy struck Ichiro Suzuki out not once, but twiceBeachy had an injury-marred, yet memorable run with the Atlanta Braves and Los Angeles Dodgers in the 2010s. He walked away from his career with many stories to tell, including ones of successful battles against many of the game’s greats.As an example, Beachy racked up 62 plate appearances against MVP winners Jimmy Rollins, Ryan Howard, Giancarlo Stanton and Ryan Braun. They went just 15-for-59 with one home run against him.It is telling, then, that the story Beachy wanted to tell is of facing Ichiro and striking him out twice.Beachy likens every batter-pitcher matchup to a chess game, and that to face Ichiro was to go tête-à-tête against someone “playing the chess game at an elite level.” His story breaks each of their three matchups from a game on June 27, 2011 down to almost molecular detail, a testament to the experience’s effect on the storyteller.”Looking back, moments like these are what made my time in the big leagues so special,” Beachy writes. “Sitting in the dugout after the game, icing my arm, I couldn’t help but think, I just struck out Ichiro Suzuki twice. It was one of those ‘I can’t believe I’m here’ moments that I’ll always cherish.”Just as a reminder, Ichiro really was that hard to faceThat Ichiro was a great hitter is self-evident. It’s right there in the stats that got him to within one vote of a unanimous selection to the Hall of Fame. He batted .311 and racked up 3,089 hits in 19 seasons. You know, those sorts of things.Yet it should not be lost to history that Ichiro was such a great hitter in part because it was next to impossible to strike him out. He fanned in only 10.1 percent of his career plate appearances, and he struck out multiple times within only 160 of his 2,653 career games. Former Mariner Eugenio Suárez has 166 such games just in the last three seasons.As for how many times Ichiro struck out multiple times against the same pitcher in a game, a spelunking session on Baseball Reference revealed that it happened only 68 times. Beachy is one of only 51 individuals in that special club, whereas 60 percent of all the pitchers Ichiro ever faced didn’t strike him out even once.Beachy’s testimony therefore deserves its place in the broader legend of Ichiro and his impact on baseball. Special thanks are owed to Beachy for his amazing story and to Ichiro for his amazing career, and also to Mariners fans who can appreciate both.