Shinnosuke Abe, manager of the Yomiuri Giants in Japanese baseball, reacted to a series of failed sacrifice bunts.
Yomiuri suffered a 3-4 loss in extra innings against the Chunichi Dragons at the Banterin Dome in Nagoya, Japan, on Sunday.
Nakagawa, who entered the game in the bottom of the 11th inning with the score tied 3-3, was hit by a two-pitch walk-off home run by Hosokawa, the first batter he faced. Nakagawa also took the loss against Hanshin on March 31, giving up a three-run homer to Morishita in the eighth inning, the second straight game he’s been hit by a home run.
According to Japanese media outlet Daily Sports, Hosokawa, who hit the game-winning home run, said after the game that it was “perfect.” Hosokawa’s first at-bat of the season was his 19th of the year, and it was a game-winning home run.
Manager Yomiuri Abe said after the game
“You can’t blame the pitchers,” and he embraced his pitching staff, who were held to three runs in the 10th inning before taking the loss. He also criticized the batters for failing to lay down sacrifice bunts.
Yomiuri failed to lay down a sacrifice bunt four times on the day. In the third inning, 안전놀이터 추천 Yamazaki attempted a sacrifice bunt with the bases loaded, but the runner was thrown out at second base. In the fourth inning, with runners on first and second with the score tied 0-0, catcher Takumi Oshiro was thrown out on a bunt-foul-bunt-foul-bunt bunt. (Yomiuri then scored three runs on three hits.)
The decisive bunt failure came in extra innings. In the 10th inning of extra innings, Sasaki failed to bunt with one out and one on. Failed to bunt, bunt foul, bunt foul for the third out. An attempt to put runners in scoring position in front of Okamoto at 4 and Sakamoto at 5 failed.
In the bottom of the 11th inning, with the bases loaded, Oshiro bunted again. He was in the bunt stance on the first pitch and watched it go for a strike. He switched to a two-pitch buster, but it was foul, and he struck out on the third pitch.
“The baseball gods are angry, and the players themselves will regret it the most, but we’ll see how they behave tomorrow,” Abe said of Sasaki and Oshiro, who failed to lay down sacrifice bunts in the 10th and 11th innings of extra innings.