The problem are the vowels. Germanic languages are notorious for having a large number of vowels that may not even be consistent across dialects. Add the funky English spelling, and it is no wonder that English speakers will mangle Japanese names beyond recognition.
But yes, Japanese has pretty simple sounds and prosody and it is easy to pick up. I studied French for 5 years, and I could never get the pronunciation right. I know how words should sound, but my mouth just refuses to do it. I also studied one year of Chinese, and while I enjoyed it a lot, good god is the phonology difficult with all the weird consonant and the tones.
But yes, Japanese has pretty simple sounds and prosody and it is easy to pick up. I studied French for 5 years, and I could never get the pronunciation right. I know how words should sound, but my mouth just refuses to do it. I also studied one year of Chinese, and while I enjoyed it a lot, good god is the phonology difficult with all the weird consonant and the tones.