The 160-kilometer fastball, the exclusive property of Sasaki Rocky of the Chiba Lotte Marines of Japan’s baseball team, has disappeared.
Sasaki, who boasts the Japanese record of highest speed tie (165 kilometers), has never thrown balls over 160 kilometers in his two appearances this year. “I’m not tired because I only come out in the 150 kilometers range,” Sasaki said with a self-taught joke.
Sasaki took the mound as a starting pitcher in a game against the Orix Buffaloes at the Jojo Marine Stadium in Chiba Prefecture, Japan on Tuesday, and pitched well, allowing three hits, two walks, and one strikeout and two runs in seven innings. Chiba Lotte won the game 5-2, marking its first win of this season.
In the early part of the game, he was shaky. With one out in the first inning, he was hit by Masahiro Nishino with a fastball of 154 kilometers, allowing a left-handed triple. As his fork ball, which he threw to strike out with two strikes against Keita Nakagawa, became a wild pitch, the third baseman allowed a run and a first run.
In the second inning, Ryu allowed consecutive walks with one out, and got a timely hit by Shuhei Fukuda. He was on the verge of getting the bases loaded with one out due to consecutive hits, but overcame the crisis of losing a large number of runs due to strikeouts and fly balls to the center field.
After that, he didn’t get any hits in the third to seventh innings. After one out in the third inning, Cedeno was on base with a hit ball, and he blocked 14 consecutive hitters with poor batting. He reduced fork balls and increased slider ratio. Against Adachi in the fourth inning, he threw only five sliders in a row to secure a strikeout. “A good pitcher has such a good pitching sense,” Yoshii said in complimenting his team’s pitching plan revision during the game.
Chiba Lotte scored five hits in the fourth inning when its team was losing 1-2, and turned the game around 5-2. “I thought (winning) would be a little difficult when I allowed two runs (in the beginning), but I received a year’s worth of support for scoring,” Sasaki said after the win.
The fastest fastball speed that attracted attention was 158 kilometers. At his first game against the Nippon Ham on July 31, he pitched 159 kilometers. His fastball of 160 kilometers has yet to come out. From the exhibition game at the spring camp, Sasaki expressed dissatisfaction with the lack of fastball speed.
According to Japanese media outlet Sports Hochi, Sasaki said after the match, “I’m not very tired because my ball is not fast recently. I can throw for a long time because I only come out in the 150km range.” Sasaki threw 111 pitches on the day, the highest number of his career in five years as a professional. 핑크알바
Meanwhile, Sasaki had a conflict with the club last winter, asking the club to post a post to advance to the Major League. Until now, there has been strong criticism that the club was greedy without repaying the club’s cherished consideration.
Sasaki, who joined Chiba Lotte as the top pick in 2019, received physical care in his first year of professional baseball in 2020 without throwing a single game. He made his debut in 2021 and spent two years managing the number of innings he pitched. Due to two injuries last year, he pitched only 91 innings in 15 games.
Scouts from eight major league teams watched the game against Nippon Ham, which was the first appearance of the season, and officials from five clubs checked Sasaki pitches on the day.