Personal Life
Matsuzaka is married to television journalist Tomoyo Shibata, formerly of Nippon TV in Japan, and in 2005 she gave birth to the couple's daughter. He also has a son, born on March 15, 2008.
Matsuzaka became involved in a scandal when he began dating Shibata. On September 13, 2000, he drove to her apartment without a valid license. He illegally parked his car and it got towed, and then had a team official take the blame in order to avoid a scandal. The truth soon got out and he was fined 195,000 yen by the police and put under house arrest for one month by the Lions.
Daisuke is nicknamed "The Monster of the Heisei Era" (平成の怪物, heisei no kaibutsu?) in Japan and "Dice-K" in the United States by the Boston Globe and USA Today.
Baseball players who were born in the 1980 academic year (from April 2, 1980 to the following April 1, 1981) have been called the "Matsuzaka Generation" in Japan.
In response to the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, Daisuke gave a charitable donation of $1 million to the Japanese Red Cross via the Red Sox Foundation. "Our efforts on the field are dedicated to all who are suffering from this catastrophe. We are in this together, so we must overcome tragedy together." Matsuzaka said in a video message. He joined with the 3 other Red Sox pitchers, team captain Jason Varitek, and other members of the Red Sox staff to collect fan donations at the gates of two spring training games at City of Palms Park, where they collected more than $4,600 in fan donations.
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