Today, a “sports” story in the right-wing Sankei Shimbun pointed out an incident at last Tuesday’s BayStars-Tigers game in Yokohama, when reliever Rowan Wick was adamant about leaving the mound when manager Daisuke Miura came out to pull him after he threw 16 pitches to three batters and Hanshin loaded the bases on two walks and a single.

According to the story, which purported to be a parable about how employers and bosses should deal with labor, Miura “showed visible emotion for the first time in his four years in charge,” and that emotion further energized the BayStars, who led 5-2 at the time to pile on five more runs in a 10-4 victory. To support that view, the article quoted second baseman Shugo Maki, the BayStars’ captain.

“It was the first time I saw the manager reveal his emotions on the field. It showed his hunger for victory, we felt we had to do our part,” Maki said.

The writer, Tetsuya Uemura, who noted that a fan in the seats behind home plate shouted, “He (Miura) should have acted like that from the very start!” and contrasted that old-school Tigers skipper Akinobu Okada.