UMass Boston

When he first stepped onto the UMass Boston campus Nao Masamotohad only lived in the United States for a year after his family'smigration from his native Japan and could not speak English verywell, but he could play baseball extremely well. The middleinfielder made the Beacon nine as a walk-on during his freshmanseason and soon became the team's starting shortstop, while settingschool-records for at-bats and assists in a season and rankingsecond on the squad in hits, runs scored and stolen bases. Masamotowas even better as a sophomore, leading the team in hits, runs,total bases and on-base percentage, while establishing a newschool-mark with 25 stolen bases, which ranked second among LittleEast Conference players. Following an arm injury, the Japaneseimport was relegated to a designated hitter role and excelled, witha .336 batting average, which led to his distinction of becomingthe first player in school history to be selected as a Little EastConference First Team All-Star. He matched the feat a year later inhis second year as the team's captain when he was named to the LECFirst Team as a second baseman after ranking third among theleague's leaders with a then school-record .425 batting average.Masamoto also placed among the league's top five in hits, runsscored and stolen bases, while maintaining a .455 on-basepercentage. He finished his career as UMass Boston's career leaderin at-bats (533), runs (124), hits (177), stolen bases (60) andtimes being hit by a pitch (21), while standing 10th with a careerbatting mark of .332. Masamoto also ranks second with 138 gamesplayed, 91 runs batted in, 30 doubles, 47 bases on balls, 236 totalbases, seven triples and 266 assists. Following his 2001 graduationfrom the Harbor campus, Masamoto secured stints with Major LeagueBaseball's Colorado Rockies and Chicago Cubs as their minor leaguestrength and conditioning coordinator before taking on his currentrole as the Cubs' major league video coordinator.