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The story
After Hiroshima Toyo Carp infielder Kaito Kozono’s contract was not renewed (effectively cutting him from the roster), he once again denied the allegations against him, stating “I have never once used ‘zombie cigarettes’ (a synthetic drug-laced cigarette)” and “I have no ties to anti-social forces (organized crime).” The team has only explained that it decided not to extend his contract because “trust had been damaged,” and no criminal charges or referral to prosecutors have been made. On 5ch, opinions split between those who see the non-renewal as a legitimate exercise of the team’s rights rather than a dismissal, and those uneasy that his future was decided while the allegations remain unresolved.
To all 11 other teams: feel free to sign him, no worries.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Innocent until proven guilty is common sense in a rule-of-law country.
They just didn't renew the contract of someone under suspicion — they didn't terminate it early or demand any penalty money.
They're just not renewing the contract once it expires. It's not like he's been blacklisted from ever working again — he's free to negotiate with other teams. Going to the Giants, or even to the majors, would be totally fine.
What's your basis for saying he can't be trusted?
Even the team doesn't trust him. If you're the only one who believes in him, go invite him to a game of sandlot ball yourself (lol) ("yakyuu" here is 5ch meme-speak for "baseball," used mockingly).
It's not a dismissal — they just didn't extend his contract.
The official reason is "damaged trust." Since they're not even citing the zombie cigarettes themselves — which are legally considered "clean" — it'll be hard for the players' union to step in.
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"They said there's no trust, so it can't be helped"
If he were really innocent, would he just let it go at that?
Not extending a contract and being fired aren't the same thing. "Fired" is what happened to guys like Kiyota (the Giants outfielder cut over a scandal).
True enough ("tashikani" said in 5ch meme-speak) — if he'd been falsely accused, he'd fight it tooth and nail, and the team should be pressing hard too. The fact that neither side is doing that makes it pretty obvious both sides are quietly agreeing to let this end in a gray area.
As long as he can still transfer to another team, that's fine by me.
Once a case has already been referred to prosecutors, nothing new is coming out — it's out of the police's hands at that point.
There's plenty of precedent — guys like Yamakawa and Tatsunori Hara.
Yamakawa won his case completely in court, so he's actually the victim — the victim of a honeypot scam.
Unless there's some extraordinary reason… can't you read? I went out of my way to spell it out and you still come back with that. There's a huge gap in legend status between him and those guys.
They're too busy obsessing over free agency for that.
It's just a contract expiring, so there's nothing for the union to act on.
They just notified him during the roster-cut notification period that they won't sign him for next year — there's nothing the union can really do about that.
"Stop the fire sale" is more a line the league office would say, not the union.
It's not "employment" (in the legal sense — he's a contracted athlete, not an employee).
He's not even that good a hitter, honestly.
You think any team would take him after seeing that press conference? lol
He flat-out said he has no ties to them, though.
Oh, so no ties then, huh? (sarcastic)
You think that alone is grounds for the team to sign a written pledge to every sponsor saying "our club has no ties to organized crime"?
Background and Key Points of This Topic
The backdrop here is a string of incidents within the Hiroshima Carp involving the quasi-synthetic drug known as “zombie cigarettes,” including the arrest of teammate Hazuki. Kozono himself has not faced any legal action such as referral to prosecutors, and since the team framed this simply as “not extending his contract,” it differs legally from a criminal penalty or disciplinary dismissal. What split the thread wasn’t so much whether to believe his denial, but whether it was fair for the team to effectively end his contract before any charges were ever filed. Two points readers might easily get wrong — both raised in the thread but worth keeping in mind as background — are that a “contract expiration” is a different procedure from a dismissal the players’ union could intervene in, and that “zombie cigarettes” themselves are, under current law, treated as a legal product.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Nandemo Jikkyo G) thread “[Good News] Kaito Kozono Declares Clearly: “Never Used Zombie Cigarettes, No Ties to Anti-Social Forces”.”
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