◇Tohoku Rakuten Eagles vs. Hokkaido Nippon-Ham 1st Game (7th, Rakuten Eagles Mobile Saikyo Park Miyagi)

Tohoku Rakuten Eagles ・ Kenta Maeda pitcher and Hokkaido Nippon-Ham ・ Kotaro Kiyomiya This was the first time in 14 years that two players from the Tohoku region played against each other.

At the press conference, he mentioned Sachi Kiyomiya's name as a player he would like to play against, and said, "We had played against each other on a TV program, and I told him that if he became a professional baseball player, we would play against each other. I'm a little happy to think that my words at that time will come true," said Maeda pitcher.

First of all, the first matchup came in the first inning, with one death runner none, giving Walk of fastball. Nevertheless, in the 3rd inning, he decided to throw his 8th pitch from full count, a 135 km/h splitter, low to the outside corner, and got a struck out miss. Maeda pitcher complained of discomfort in his leg in the 4th inning with one out and one on, and got off mound.

Text by Rioko Niwa