The possibility of starting the World Baseball Classic (WBC) Korea-Japan match for Ohtani Shohei (29, LA Angels), the “unanimous MVP,” has been raised.
Sports Nippon, through its online version on the 18th, predicted the operation of the Japanese baseball team’s mound by synthesizing the information that manager Hideki Kuriyama had revealed.
According to media reports, the starting pitcher in the first round of the Korean War, which will be held on March 10th, can pitch in the quarterfinals on the 15th or 16th. Based on this, the media predicted, “Otani will pitch in the first round big match Korea-Japan match and then pitch again in the quarterfinals according to the WBC pitch count regulation.” 먹튀검증
Ohtani is a world-class baseball star. Ohtani, who was selected as the MLB AL unanimous MVP in the 2021 season, showed an amazing performance in the 2022 season with 34 homers as a hitter and a 15-9 loss and 2.33 ERA as a pitcher.
Ohtani, fearsome just by hearing his name, was also very strong against Korea. He pitched twice against Korea in the 2015 Premier 12, leaving a strong impression with a total of 13 scoreless innings and 21 strikeouts.
In addition to Ohtani, the Japanese mound is overflowing with threatening ace-class starters such as Darvish Yu (San Diego Padres), who has reached 15 MLB wins. However, in the first round of the WBC, it is evaluated that the influence of the ace pitcher is somewhat diminished due to the limit on the number of pitches tied to 65 or less.
Japan was placed in Group B with Korea, China, Australia, and the Czech Republic at the WBC. Sookmyung’s Korea-Japan match will be held at Tokyo Dome on March 10th at 7pm. The Korea-Japan match, which can be called the highlight of the WBC, is the first in 14 years since 2009.