Monday, November 30, 2009

Game Report: Under-26 NPB Kids vs. College Kids @ Tokyo Dome

(This is being published a month after I started writing it. Oops.)

As it turns out, I didn't go to any fan fests this weekend. I slept in on Saturday after an exhausting week and didn't make it to the Sea Rex event, but Westbay went and hopefully he'll write it up sometime soon. I was at the Legends bar on Saturday night to see Bobby and friends, and then Sunday went to see the U-26 vs. College baseball game at the Tokyo Dome. Monday was a national holiday, but I think riding my bicycle home in the rain on Sunday night turned whatever I had into a full-fledged cold, so instead of going down to Jingu or the Seibu Dump, I stayed at home, rested, and studied Japanese in preparation for failing the JLPT Level 2 next weekend. Hooray.

The U26 game started at 2pm, but the Dome opened at 11am, with almost the entire stadium being unreserved seating. I arrived around 12:15, and the place was already packed. I ended up finding a seat on the second floor, behind 3rd base, about 6 rows back.

You want to hear something ridiculous, though? Game programs were already sold out by the time I got there! How the heck does THAT happen?! Were the people running this event a bunch of idiots or something? The game tickets sold out a few days beforehand, at a dome that holds around 45,000 people, and they are sold out of programs almost TWO HOURS before the games starts? SOMEONE screwed up here. Besides, in my opinion, they shouldn't have even been selling programs in the first place -- they should have been giving out information sheets to anyone who came in. From listening to the people around me, it was pretty clear very few of them had any clue who any of the college players were besides Yuki Saitoh.

The college kids REALLY looked outmatched at the beginning, though. Saitoh pitched the first inning, and gave up a run, a leadoff single by the Giants' wonderboy Hayato Sakamoto, who was moved up when teammate Tetsuya Matsumoto walked. The Carp's Soichiro Amaya grounded into a double play after that, but Sakamoto moved to third and scored on a (Hanshin overaged) Takahiro Arai single.

The college batters spent the first 5 innings flailing against the NPB pitchers though -- Maeken, Ohmine, Hirano, Kaneto, and Kume-kun combined for 5 innings, one hit, no walks, and 7 strikeouts. Ohmine even struck out the side when he was out there. It was really looking grim.

But then Kenji Ohtonari came out there to pitch for NPB, and... suddenly the college kids came to life. Doshisha's Seiji Kobayashi led off with a hit -- the second one of the game for the college squad. Toyo's Ryo Hayashizaki bunted him up, and then Shota Ishimine hit a grounder that bounced off pitcher Ohtonari's leg and rolled to short for an infield single. It was unclear if Ohtonari was injured, but he shook off the staff that came out to check on him, and pitched to Hosei's Hiroshi Taki with runners at the corners. Taki lofted a high fly ball to shallow left field, and quite embarrassingly for wonderboy Sakamoto, the ball DROPPED for another single and Kobayashi scored, making the score 1-1. Shohei Habu was hit by a pitch to make it bases loaded with one out, but Ohtonari managed to get pop flies out of Wakamatsu and Echizen after that to get out of the jam.

That was the only time the college kids threatened on offense, really. But somehow the NPB kids didn't manage to push ahead any more runs either. My Ohishi-kun came out and pitched really well in the bottom of the 6th, striking out Amaya and Kamei. He was followed by Yusuke Nomura, who struck out Ohzaki and Ginjiro, but also gave up a hit to Yamato and walked Sho Nakata, and a passed ball allowed Yamato to get all the way to 3rd, bt he didn't score. Kazuki Nishijima, the Tokyo Big 6 ERA title holder for this semester, came out for the 8th... and promptly walked Tetsuya Matsumoto and gave up a hit to Soichiro Amaya, so the college squad changed pitchers to Tomoyuki Sugano, the boy from Tokai University who also happens to be Tatsunori Hara's nephew. What bugs me about Sugano is not that he is Hara's nephew, but that being Hara's nephew means the Giants will probably have some inside way to draft him... and every time I see him pitch, he's fantastic. Which is depressing.

Sugano didn't disappoint here either, coming in with no outs and runners at the corners and retiring the next three batters to keep the 1-1 tie game, as well as pitching the 9th inning and only giving up one hit.

And so it ended in a 1-1 tie. What does that mean? I'm not really sure. Either that I'm totally right about how next year will be a monster draft year for college players, or that the NPB kids weren't doing their best? Either way, I cheered (quietly) for all of my favorite college players and it was good. And it was neat for Taki-kun to get the tying RBI, even if it was on a kind of lame hit.

It was weird because there was an ouendan of sorts for the NPB players, with them playing songs from all the teams involved, but there was no ouendan for the college players, so things were remarkably quiet when those guys were up to bat. A bit weird.

Anyway, here is my scorecard from the game...


College Kids 1 - 1 U-26 NPB
Sunday, November 22, 2009

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E
College 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 5 0
U-26 NPB 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 9 0

College AB R H RB K BB SH SB E 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
(TOK) Ishimine, cf 4 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 f4 .. KS .. .. S6 .. G4 ..
(HOS) Taki, ss 3 0 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 KS .. .. G1 .. S6 .. .. ..
(THF) Abe, ss 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. .. F7 ..
(WAS) Habu, lf 2 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 F7 .. .. KS .. HP .. .. ..
(RIK) Tanaka, lf 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. G6
(KIN) Wakamatsu, dh 4 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 .. KS .. KS .. f2 .. .. f9
(RIS) Echizen, rf 4 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 .. KS .. .. L7 F3 .. .. G3
(MEI) Araki, 3b 3 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 .. KC .. .. G1 .. S6 .. ..
(RIK) Okazaki, 3b 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..
(KSG) Hagiwara, 1b 3 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 .. .. S8 .. G3 .. KS .. ..
(AGU) Koike, c 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 .. .. b1 .. .. .. .. .. ..
(DOS) Kobayashi, c 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. S8 .. .. ..
(WAS) Sugiyama, c 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. F8 .. ..
(TOY) Hayashizaki, 2b 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 .. .. F8 .. .. b5 .. .. ..
(ASI) Ono, 2b 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. .. G4 ..


College IP BF NP H HR K BBH WP RA ER
(WAS) Saitoh 1 5 18 2 0 0 1 0 1 1
(TOY) Inui 1 4 18 0 0 2 1 0 0 0
(CHU) Sawamura 1 3 15 1 0 1 0 0 0 0
(ASI) Higashihama 1 3 17 0 0 1 1 0 0 0
(KIN) Nakaushiro 1 4 17 2 0 1 0 0 0 0
(WAS) Ohishi 1 4 18 1 0 2 0 0 0 0
(MEI) Nomura 1 5 18 1 0 2 1 0 0 0
(MEI) Nishijima 0 2 6 1 0 0 1 0 0 0
(TOK) Sugano 2 7 22 1 0 2 0 0 0 0

WAS - Waseda, MEI - Meiji, RIK - Rikkio, HOS - Hosei, ASI - Asia, TOY - Toyo,
AGU - Aoyama Gakuin, RIS - Rissho, CHU - Chuo, TOK - Tokai, KIN - Kinki,
DOS - Doshisha, THF - Tohoku Fukushi, KSG - Kansai Gakuin


U-26 NPB AB R H RB K BB SH SB E 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
(YOM) Sakamoto, ss 5 1 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 S7 .. KS .. KS .. G1 .. G5
(YOM) Matsumoto, cf 2 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 BB .. G6 .. .. F8 .. BB ..
(HIR) Amaya, lf 4 0 2 0 1 0 0 1 0 d4 .. S4 .. .. KS .. S8 ..
(HAN) Arai, 3b 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 S9 .. .. BB .. .. .. .. ..
(HIR) Kokubo, pr-3b 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. S8 .. F8 ..
(YOM) Kamei, rf-1b 4 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 G3 .. .. F7 .. KS .. f5 ..
(TYS) Tanaka, 2b 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 .. BB .. KS .. .. .. .. ..
(HAN) Yamato, 2b 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. S8 .. ..
(CLM) Nemoto, ph-2b 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. .. KS ..
(ORX) Okada, 1b 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 .. KS .. .. G6 .. .. .. ..
(SEI) Ohzaki, lf 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. KS .. G5
(NHF) Nakata, dh 3 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 .. G6 .. .. S8 .. BB .. KS
(SEI) Ginjiro, c 3 0 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 .. KS .. .. S9 .. KS .. ..
(RAK) Shima, c 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. S9
(CHU) Iwasaki, pr 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..


U-26 NPB IP BF NP H HR K BBH WP RA ER
(HIR) Maeda 1 3 9 0 0 1 0 0 0 0
(CLM) Ohmine 1 3 13 0 0 3 0 0 0 0
(SEI) Hirano 1 4 10 1 0 1 0 0 0 0
(YOM) Kaneto 1 3 17 0 0 2 0 0 0 0
(SFT) Kume 1 3 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
(SFT) Ohtonari 1 7 20 3 0 0 1 0 1 1
(CLM) Karakawa 1 3 8 1 0 1 0 0 0 0
(TYS) Yoshinori 1 3 11 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
(YOK) Yamaguchi 1 3 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0


And some photos.


Crowds outside the dome. There was high security because the prime minister was throwing out the ceremonial first pitch.


Goods tents. You guys suck for being sold out of the program so early.


A display with the Team Japan uniforms.


An hour or two before the game, they took photos of the NPB and college players together.


Announcing Handkerchief Boy as the college starting pitcher.


Full lineups with Kume-kun being announced (who I first saw pitch when he was still at Meiji, but who now plays for the Softbank Hawks.) Kenta Maeda started for the NPB team though.


Lining up to a full Tokyo Dome.


Prime minister Yukio Hatoyama comes out to throw the ceremonial first pitch.


Hatoyama in his box later on in the game, still wearing his Japan jersey.


Nakata Sho had to wear #5 for this because Sakamoto had #6.


Chuo's Hirokazu Sawamura, who can theoretically throw 156km/h. He's pretty awesome, though he might find himself cursed by his name.




Hiroshi Taki! Best 9 as a freshman!



My college baseball boyfriend Tatsuya Ohishi.


Tomoyuki Sugano. Sigh.


Final bow -- just like in a normal college or high school game.


And the final score up on the board.

Sorry I never got around to posting this, but December was a rough month for many reasons. This was my last baseball game of 2009, though.

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