Frank Joseph Ortenzio Jr. (born February 24, 1951) is a former

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

first baseman. He played nine games for the

Kansas City Royals The Kansas City Royals are an American professional baseball team based in Kansas City, Missouri. The Royals compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) Central division. The team was founded as an expans ...

in . He also played two seasons ( and ) in Japan for the

Nankai Hawks The are a Japanese professional baseball team based in Fukuoka, Fukuoka Prefecture. They compete in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) as a member of the Pacific League. The team was formerly known as the Nankai Hawks and was based in Osaka. ...

. During his time with the Nankai Hawks, he was given the registered name, "Ohtenjoh (王天上)", which translates into the king above heaven. You would see this on scoreboards and in the newspaper. Normally foreign players in Japan are given names in

katakana is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji and in some cases the Latin script (known as rōmaji). The word ''katakana'' means "fragmentary kana", as the katakana characters are derived fr ...

, but because his last name appeared close to Japanese sounds, the team decided to give him a

kanji are the logographic Chinese characters taken from the Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script and used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese ...

pictograph name.

Sources

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ortenzio, Frank Major League Baseball first basemen Kansas City Royals players Nankai Hawks players Corning Royals players Billings Mustangs players San Jose Bees players Jacksonville Suns players Omaha Royals players Denver Bears players Hawaii Islanders players American expatriate baseball players in Japan Baseball players from California Sportspeople from Fresno, California 1951 births Living people American Association (1902–1997) MVP Award winners Arizona Instructional League Royals players