You can probably point to one pitch -- a 98-mph fastball -- that came to ruin one man's life.

It was 1996, and a kid named Hideki Irabu of the Chiba Lotte Marines tossed that pitch past a stunned Kazuhiro Kiyohara of the Seibu Lions. At the time it was the fastest pitch in Japanese baseball history.

With ERAs in the 2.50 region and multiple years with 200-plus strikeouts, and with players like Hideo Nomo, Shigetoshi Hasegawa and Takashi Kashiwada -- who signed across town for the New York Mets -- George Steinbrenner and the New York Yankees wanted to make a move. Hideki Irabu – ‘The Nolan Ryan of Japan’ -- was their man.

This wasn’t the first time the Yankees played catch-up in race ball. The Brooklyn Dodgers broke baseball’s color barrier in 1947 with Jackie Robinson, the Yankees waited until 1955 before they activated Elston Howard. Howard was an incredible player, someone who survived the pressure of being the catcher who succeeded Yogi Berra. His number is retired with the Yankees, and he is forever enshrined in the baseball Hall of Fame at Cooperstown.

Hideki Irabu is no longer with us.

His story begins and ends as a sad one. His father was an unseen, never-spoken-of American serviceman who met his mother one night in Okinawa. In a culture that abhors any sort of disgrace, Irabu’s mother later married a Japanese man who instilled enough discipline in the boy to play and succeed wildly in baseball.

With that fastball, American scouts took notice. The San Diego Padres bit first, purchasing his contract from Chiba Lotte. It was controversial at the time because up to that point, no American baseball team had directly intervened with Japanese baseball negotiations in such a manner. And in a culture that steadfastly adheres to an intricate code of manners, Irabu bucked the trend. He would only play for the Yankees.

In March 1997, for the rights to just talk to the 27-year-old Irabu, the Yanks gave the Padres $3 million in cash, five mid-tier major leaguers and five minor-league prospects. By May, Irabu was in pinstripes, signed to a four-year contract worth $12.8 million and a signing bonus of $8.5 million.

Irabu went on to win 34 games in his six-year Major League Baseball career.

He endured insults from Steinbrenner (‘fat toad’) and Yankee fans alike who couldn’t support a guy who only played in one postseason game but wore two championship rings.

Alcohol played a bigger part in his life after the big leagues turned their back on him, and after a few arrests for intoxication and whatever presumed family problems he had, his wife left him.

It was as if his life had come full circle. His solution was to hang himself last July.

It has been said that there is no such thing as talent, there is only pressure. Pressure, over many years, makes a diamond. For Hideki, on and off the diamond, he just couldn’t make the time.