NPB Bullet Points: Darvish K’s 1000, Iwakuma Throws 147, Kanemoto Still Runs
News and notes from around NPB. Japanese links only tonight.
- Yu Darvish recorded his 1000th career strikeout on the 26th, picking up the win over Softbank. Darvish reached the milestone in 1058.2 innings pitched, the seventh fastest pace in NPB history.
- Darvish didn’t have the top game of the night though, as Hisashi Iwakuma struck out 13 Seibu Lions, going the distance for a 147 pitch shutout.
- Veteran Hanshin slugger Tomoaki Kanemoto became the oldest player to steal a base in NPB history, when he swiped second in the eight in against Hiroshima on the 27. “Aniki” is 43 years and 23 days old.
- Yokohama is bringing back lefty Stephen Randolph. Randolph worked out for the BayStars following the placement of Brent Leach on the restricted list.\
- Daily Sports reports that Brian Bannister has informed the Yomiuri Giants that he has no plans to pitch in the US or Japan this season.
- Television ratings for Yuki Saito’s pro debut on the 17th peaked at 29.4% of Hokkaido homes, the highest ever for a regular season Nippon Ham Fighters game.
- Now on sale at the Lotteria in Chiba’s QVC Marine Field: Saburo Burgers.
27/04/2011 at 12:31 am Permalink
it stupid that Brian Bannister doesn’t feel like going back to japan because of two earthquakes, so he willing to sit out full yr of no baseball what a baby… Is brent Leach doing that also? How is Randy Messanger doing right now???
27/04/2011 at 12:33 am Permalink
Nice info. The burger on poster:
http://www.daily.co.jp/baseball/2011/04/19/p1_0003975655.shtml
I’m a little concerned that Kuma has a velocity drop. I recall him topping 90-91 with his cutter. Perhaps it’s a discrepancy due to the radar gun used in the unconventional stadium (Oojiyama, 皇åå±±), but still, manager Hoshino is not known for protecting his pitchers.
And I guess that’s it for Banny. He might as well join Rob Neyer on SB Nation to be part of “us,” not just “them.” LOL
27/04/2011 at 6:57 am Permalink
Actually Kuma tops out at more like 93, 149 kmph. You can you get a sense for his career norms here: http://www.npbtracker.com/data/player.php?p_id=157
Hoshino burn-out did cross my mind when I saw that he threw 147 pitches.
I hope Banny joins Fangraphs and not SB Nation 🙂
27/04/2011 at 11:13 am Permalink
Thanks, Patrick. I was thinking 148 km/hr, but my translation fails at math.
Banny @Fangraphs… He’s a fit for the NERD! LOL
27/04/2011 at 1:05 pm Permalink
http://www.marines.co.jp/news/detail/6814.html
It’s a menchi-katsu burger with cabbage, for 580 yen. Bit pricey for that kinda thing… I regularly used to get menchi-katsu burgers at the bakery near my place in north Tokyo for like 220 yen, but they weren’t SABURO BURGERS I suppose, and not stadium food prices. (Being back in the US has made me appreciate how cheap Japanese stadium food prices were…)
If Saburo hits a homerun the burger goes from 580 yen to 360 yen. I can’t see THAT happening a lot.
I wonder why they don’t try these things out at the Plena Makuhari Lotteria too — that was always my biggest complaint during the latter years of Bobby Burgers, you could only get them at the stadium.
28/04/2011 at 2:27 pm Permalink
Ahh, the ground-pork (menchi-katsu) sandwich! You brought up my youthful memory, Deanna. I was looking for a job in Tokyo for 2 months, meanwhile took a Japanese language program (not that I learned anything there; I still thank my college in the Midwest home of Stan Musial for their great language program).
I lived with my aunt, a family of three and a 45 minutes train ride from the school. Every morning, I rushed to take the train during Tokyo’s tyrannic rush hour. That line between Ebisu and Akane was FAMOUS FOR SEXUALLY HARASS-HAPPY “chikan.”
Anyway, I would, literally, RUN to the convenient store “D” in the middle of the station and grab something to fill me up. It was always a menchi-katsu sandwich of 180 yen, plus a strawberry-milk. There was nothing in the sandwich but fried grounded pork.
Day in, day out. The grease and the malnutrition of that sandwich sometimes made me sick, but it was the cheapest choice of a big breakfast for my convenience back then. (The 150 yen MacDonald’s morning egg sandwich needed waiting time.)
Then one day I thought: this whole rush hour and nasty food are putting stress on my body, so I decided to save my health. I made soba noodle on a fly with chopped veggies and watched live baseball in the morning, going late to that useless language program and avoid Tokyo’s crazy rush hour. I had a subscription of MLB.tv, and boy, MLB Advanced Media helped me learn the game, to say the least.
Anyway, I got to know my aunt’s son a little more, who went to college, but like most suburban Japanese, lived with his family on an apartment “mansion.” He happened to leave for school right around 7th inning stretch. Then I used all those money saved on a bullet-train ride to the elegant and ancient capital of Kyoto in my third month.
Thank to the menchi sandwich. Amen.