Today two players stood out during the training in Aki. The pitcher Minoru Iwata had good results facing the line-up of the young players, and Hiroki Uemoto almost reached the speed of the former captain Norihiro Akahoshi.
Minoru Iwata has had an operation on the left elbow and did not play during this season. Today he pitched during 5 innings giving up 4 hits and no runs.
Last year, Hanshin lost his fastest runner when Akahoshi quit baseball because of health problems. Five young players are likely to take over from him: Yamato, Shunsuke, Tagami, Shibata and Uemoto. The latter distinguished himself by being the fastest to reach the second base: 3"29 seconds. That is to say, 0"03 seconds less than Akahoshi's time!
The catchers are also motivated. Next season, Komiyama will switch his number from 60 to 39. It was Yano's number, the symbolic catcher of Hanshin who retired this year.
For their part, the club's managers are planning to take on catchers from other teams, like Fujii from Rakuten or Hosokawa from Seibu... There are already more than enough catchers in Hanshin, but apparently the managers prefer waste time in negotiations, rather than think about a training method that will pull our young catchers up to the level of Johjima or Yano.
Hiroki Uemoto
Photo: (c) Sanspo
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