From Australia to Japan to Lawrence, meet KU baseball’s own Mr. Worldwide
Chase Diggins never expected to be here.
Here, in this instance, means multiple things.
The first refers to playing college baseball for the Kansas Jayhawks, and the second applies to the country in which the native of Perth, Australia, currently resides.
Diggins started playing baseball at age 7, introduced to the sport by his Japanese grandpa, Kazuhiro Yoshizu. He credits his grandfather (and others in his family) for pushing him to pursue baseball beyond high school.
Still, he never thought he’d eventually end up in Lawrence, Kansas, in the U.S., playing a pivotal role for one of the best KU baseball teams ever.
“I never realized I was good at the sport,” Diggins told The Star. “When I played with my brother, I always played age groups up and I always kind of sucked.”
The journey to wearing the crimson and blue has been long and arduous for Diggins. He’s a second baseman who’s also made spot-starts at catcher. He’s different from many of his teammates, sporting a bushy mustache and speaking in a thick Australian accent.
Now, he is batting .245 with four home runs and 19 RBIs in 45 games as the Jayhawks (37-17, 15-9 Big 12) chase a Big 12 title and beyond.
To understand how Diggins wound up in Lawrence, it’s best to begin where it all started.
Down Under.
Australia ... and beyond
Little did he know it at the time, Diggins’ first step toward playing baseball in America was competing in the Little League World Series.
He was 12 years old and his team in Western Australia had qualified for an event every baseball-playing kid dreams about.
“It was an eye-opener of how many fans there and how many baseball people there are in the world, especially (compared to) Australia, where it’s not as big,” he said. “Baseball was never really that big.”
This one of the reasons Diggins, who is half Japanese, moved to Japan at age 15. He lived with his sister and mother.
He grew up speaking Japanese, but he couldn’t read or write the language. Japanese, which he said has three different writing systems (Kanji, Hiragana, and Katakana), was “insanely difficult” to learn, he said.
Diggins recalled taking a Japanese placement test for Doshisha International School in Kyoto. He wrote his name at the top and left the rest of the test blank.
“Not one word (was written),” he said. “It’s not because I couldn’t read, but I also couldn’t write. I couldn’t even read the question; I didn’t even know what it was talking about.
“The teacher walks up, and she’s like, ‘Why haven’t you written anything?’ If I hadn’t been able to speak Japanese, I don’t know what I would have done.”
Diggins was placed in the lowest classes. During lunchtime, he spent much of his first year doing extra tutoring work with teachers.
That was just one part of Diggins’ jam-packed day, which began at 5:30 a.m. To get to school, he’d take two or three trains and then walk 15 minutes before arriving on campus around 7:15 a.m.
He’d then practice baseball for an hour before classes and lunch. Baseball practice would resume at 3:30 p.m. and end at 7:30 p.m.
Then he’d take a train home, arriving back at his place around 9 p.m.
“Before you know, it’s 10:30 and you haven’t touched your homework,” he said. “Homework that you’ve been told to do by every single teacher in the school. So, you kind of have to stay up. If you want to play baseball in school, you’ve got to make sure your schoolwork is good.”
The competition on the diamond was certainly tougher than Diggins had encountered in Australia. He said baseball in Japan is more focused on mechanics than his home country, or even America.
He also didn’t play in his first year due to a Japanese concept called “kohai/senpai” — a sort of social hierarchy.
Diggins told The Star he was expected to be learning constantly, and that everything he did was one only after everyone else had already had a turn. He would pack up equipment, clean the individual baseballs and even maintain the entire dirt field.
This was intended to instill discipline, an important part of Japanese culture. It wasn’t exactly an easy adjustment for Diggins.
“In the moment, I’m not going to lie: It was probably the most difficult thing I’ve ever done,” he said of the humbling experience. “Looking back, I’m also most grateful that I was able to experience that and learn from that experience.”
Another continent to explore
In his last year of high school, Diggins earned an opportunity to continue his playing career at a Japanese university.
While grateful, he wasn’t sure if he could play in Japan for another few years. He thought it would be “mentally draining.” Like he had during high school in Japan, Diggins would have to pay his dues.
He probably wouldn’t play a lick of baseball for at least 4-5 months. And he wasn’t keen on going through all of that again.
Instead, he decided to return to Australia around March 2019. He worked multiple jobs and played club baseball for two years in his home country.
All the while, his mother, Misato Diggins, continued to hope her son would get a chance to play baseball in America. She convinced him to pursue the opportunity, but he had no idea where to start.
He’d eventually get some help from an Australian friend who introduced him to the baseball coach from Odessa College, a junior-college in Texas.
Diggins had no idea what “juco” was, or that it entailed a two-year commitment. But after some discussion, he was offered and accepted a spot on the college team.
The JUCO experience isn’t typically an easy one. It’s oftentimes the make-or-break point of a prospect’s baseball career.
Luckily for Diggins, his resolve was steeled from his experiences with discipline in Japan.
“It was definitely hard, but I think the years I had in Japan… they say that practices are long and dreadful — I thought they were fine,” he said.
After two seasons in Texas, he’d garnered interest from several four-year schools, including Kansas, Kansas State and Arizona.
He said he picked KU because the coaches won him over. He also appreciated how friendly everyone was on his visit to Lawrence. He also came at the perfect time, in the fall.
“Sometimes weather’s not great (here), but when I came on my visit, the weather was pretty great,” he said with a smile.
Diggins joined the Jayhawks before the 2024 season. In 26 games, he batted .291 with three home runs and 16 RBIs.
He had never been to the Sunflower State before. His only knowledge of Kansas came from an experience his brother had playing baseball for Colby Community College.
Still, he fit right in as a Jayhawk.
“It’s a really inviting and welcoming program,” he said. “It’s not necessarily where you sleep that’s home. It’s the people you’re surrounded and the people that you are with.”
Future unknown
Despite his many moves over the years, Diggins has mastered the art of staying present in the moment.
The only thing he’s focused on right now is making sure the Jayhawks go as far as possible this season. He isn’t exactly surprised by KU’s improvement from last year.
“Maybe not record-wise, but the pieces that we had — me and my roommates talked about it all the time in the fall,” he said. “You feel the connection on this team.
“That plays not just a part in how good everyone is, but last year we had such a talented team, individually, such a talented team that could never mesh.
“This team, everyone meshes well, and you could see it in the fall when we played our two scrimmage games and we played our intra-squad game.”
The Jayhawks (37-13) were to begin a series against BYU Thursday. KU had six regular-season games left until the Big 12 Tournament starts on May 21.
Diggins will participate in senior day festivities Friday, with his mother coming to visit from Japan. His father, Courtney Diggins, has stayed in Lawrence for the last few months and plans to stick around until the Big 12 tourney.
Diggins has another year of college eligibility remaining, but he said he hasn’t thought that far ahead.
He’s focused on the now — being patient and present, like he learned in Japan and Australia.
“It’s hard not to (think about it), but it’s easy to push aside,” he said of the future. “I’ve been asked by my dad and I’ve been asked by multiple people — What are my plans and what do I want to do? They asked me at the wrong time.
“During the season, my only thought is the season. For me to think ahead into the future, to me that’s giving up on the season. My plans for the future is to enjoy the season with my guys.”
This story was originally published May 8, 2025 at 10:43 AM.
