Monster hitter’ Munetaka Murakami (23) was brought down.
Shugo Maki (25), the fourth hitter of the Yokohama Bay Stars, hit his 25th home run of the season. He hit a two-run home run in the bottom of the 7th inning against the Yomiuri Giants held at Yokohama Stadium on the 1st. Starting against the Hanshin Tigers on August 29, he hit home runs in three consecutive games.바카라사이트
Bottom of the 7th inning, 6-2 ahead, 1 out, 1 base. He hit a high ball thrown by Yomiuri right-hander Kohei Suzuki at a speed of 148 km/h and went over the left fence. He retired with a fly ball in the previous three at-bats, but did not miss a stray ball in the fourth at-bat.
He pushed Murakami, who had been struggling recently, to third place and rose to second place. Murakami has been silent since hitting No. 24 against Yokohama on August 17. No home runs for 2 weeks.
Murakami, who hit 56 home runs last year, surpassed the ‘legend’ Sadaharu Oh (Wang Jeong-chi) and set a new record for the most by a Japanese hitter in a single season. At the age of 22, he became the youngest player to win three awards in batting average, home runs, and RBI. He started the season aiming for his third consecutive home run title, but there is a possibility that he will fall to third place behind Maki.
His batting skills have been at the bottom recently. In the game against the Hanshin Tigers on the 1st, he went 0-hit in 4 at-bats and struck out 3. Last 3
He is 0-for-10 with five strikeouts in the game and 2-for-21 with 10 strikeouts in his last six games. The team is also struggling due to the poor performance of the number 4 hitter. Yakult, which won the Central League championship for two consecutive years, is in 5th place, 5.5 games behind 3rd place Yokohama.
Yomiuri’s fourth hitter, Kazuma Okamoto (28), hit his 35th home run of the season and 200th of his career in his first at-bat in the first inning against Yokohama on this day. The gap has been longer since hitting No. 34 in the Hiroshima Carp match on August 20th.
Okamoto, Maki, and Murakami, ranked 1st to 3rd in home runs in the Central League, are the main players in the Japanese team winning the WBC (World Baseball Classic). Okamoto played as the starting first baseman, Maki as second baseman, and Murakami as third baseman.
He returned to his team and continued competing for the home run title. From the middle of the first half, Okamoto has taken the lead and is dominating. It ended up being a competition between Murakami and Maki for second place.
Okamoto and Murakami are sluggers who have each won the home run title twice. On the other hand, Maki, in his third year as a pro, is looking at his first 30 home runs of the year. The number of home runs increased every year. He hit 22 in 2021, his debut season, and 24 in 2022. He surpassed his most home runs in a season in 118 games.
His batting pace is very good recently.
He went 11-for-27 and batted .477 over his last six games. He raised his season batting average to .300. As a 4th hitter, he had excellent clutch ability, hitting .368 with runners in scoring position (39 hits in 106 at-bats).
Maki, who had 6 RBIs in 3 games, pushed out Okamoto and returned to first place in RBIs.
Maki ranks 1st to 3rd with 87, Okamoto with 84, and Murakami with 70. 87 is his record for most RBIs in a season.
