You really missed that? It was pretty big news back in February, when there were no other races of note happening. The US media does tend to ignore this sort of thing, so I can kind of understand knowing little to nothing about it.
The disconnect? The US public doesn't care about marathons as sport, period. Rupp or Deena could walk your average shopping mall in any town (not named Boulder, Flagstaff, Eugene, or Portland) for a couple of hours on a weekend day and go unnoticed. Suzuki may have missed on the million yen bonus yet he's a bonafide star celebrity in Japan now from that one race. Granted, he also had a bit of a reputation from a great ekiden performance prior to that.
US distance stars also dilute themselves across events. In Japan, it's the ekiden through college and then the marathon after, with few exceptions.