Chiba Lotte Marines Fireballer pitcher Sasaki Loki (22) confessed his relationship with the target he longed for.바카라
Sasaki met Rakuten Golden Eagles pitcher Masahiro Tanaka (35) at the Japan Professional Baseball All-Star Game held on the 19th and 20th. In a joint interview hosted by ‘TV Asahi’, the 13-year-old players wore the same Pacific League All-Star uniforms and held each other high.
Tanaka, who started playing for Rakuten in 2007 and won 78 wins with the New York Yankees from 2014 to 2020 and returned to Rakuten in 2021, said of Sasaki, the holder of the record for the fastest speed in Japanese professional baseball (165 km/h), Tanaka.
Sasaki said, “Tanaka-senpai has been a player I admired since I started watching baseball when I was young. I still have a Rakuten uniform with Tanaka-senpai’s number 18 engraved on it at home.” Tanaka was surprised and replied, “Really? Thank you.”
Sasaki then brought up the story of Game 3 of the Japan Professional Baseball All-Star Game, which was held in Iwate Prefecture, Japan on July 23, 2012. Sasaki, from Iwate, has painful memories of losing his father during the Great East Japan Earthquake in March 2011. Around 2,400 children affected by the earthquake were invited to the All-Star Game, and Sasaki was one of them. And the Pacific League starting pitcher that day was Tanaka.
Sasaki said, “I was watching from the outfield stand, and the throwing and pitching were amazing, and the feeling of fighting spirit was really cool. I also participated in the disaster area baseball class event held in Sendai City in January 2013.” At that time, Japanese star players such as Tanaka, Hayato Sakamoto (Yomiuri Giants), and Kenta Maeda (Minnesota Twins) participated in the baseball class.
Tanaka was really surprised, saying, “I just knew it for the first time.” When Sasaki said, “When I joined Chiba Lotte, I mentioned Tanaka-senpai’s name as a role model. I dreamed of becoming a professional baseball player after seeing Tanaka-senpai’s 24-game winning streak, which led to Rakuten’s victory in 2013.”
When Sasaki said, “I haven’t filled the required innings yet. I want to hear the secret of how to throw for a long time,” Tanaka encouraged Sasaki, saying, “You just have to keep throwing and feel various things for yourself and grow. These days, the velocity deviation has decreased and I feel more stable. It’s amazing that I’m constantly leveling up.”
The two players ended the interview with a handshake, cheering each other on for a healthy season completion. The relationship between the new and old aces who are being reborn as the representative pitchers of Japanese professional baseball started a long time ago and is expected to continue for a long time in the future.