Tag Archives: Shintaro Fujinami

NPB news: Oct. 15, 2022

And then there were two.

The Orix Buffaloes, the jokes of the Pacific League for much of the last two decades, beat a good SoftBank Hawks team to book their second straight trip to the Japan Series against the Yakult Swallows, who earned their berth on Friday.

We also had more managing news as Hanshin waited less than 24 hours since their playoff exit to announce their new old manager, while Kodai Senga began singing “Free at last, Free at last,” and Shintaro Fujinami asked why some players find it so hard to leave Japan.

Continue reading NPB news: Oct. 15, 2022

NPB news: Sept. 18, 2022

Hawks manager Hiroshi Fujimoto challenged his ace Kodai Senga to be as good on Sunday as Buffaloes ace Yoshinobu Yamamoto had been against them on Saturday, and a second-straight pitchers’ duel ensued between SoftBank and Orix, whose starter had also been challenged the day before, by Yamamoto.

Atsushi Kittaka, who before Kazuyuki Shirai was the Japanese umpire most famously associated with in-game trouble, got a round of applause at a ballpark where he made one of his most infamous marks, although a rumor of him finally getting hit by a ball thrown by a pitcher were exaggerated.

Kittaka has an impressive resume of issues, but at Koshien on July 31, 1998, Giants pitcher Balvino Galvez took issue with the ump squeezing his strike zone, and when he was being lifted from the game after surrendering a home run, he heaved a ball across the diamond at Kittaka. Galvez missed him but was suspended for the rest of the season.

Sunday’s game was Kittaka’s 3,000th, and he received a warm round of applause from the fans and a bouquet of flowers was handed to him rather than thrown at him.

Let’s get to the games, shall we?

Buffaloes 2, Hawks 0: At Osaka Dome, Hiroya Miyagi (11-7) allowed an infield single, a walk, and a hit batsman, all in the same fourth inning, and left the bases loaded while bowling four perfect frames to earn the win.

Continue reading NPB news: Sept. 18, 2022