Even before the debut match, the word ‘overpay’ followed like a ‘tag’. But that is no longer the case for Masataka Yoshida (Boston Red Sox). Now, he is having a dazzling season to the extent of winning the title of ‘Rookie of the Year’.
Yoshida stepped on the pro stage after being nominated by the Orix Buffaloes in the first round of the 2015 Nippon Professional Baseball Rookie Draft. As can be seen from his nomination order, expectations were high for Yoshida, and he showed off his skills properly on the professional stage. Yoshida began to stand out, appearing in 63 games in his debut season, with 67 hits, 10 home runs, a batting average of 0.290 and an OPS of 0.854.
Yoshida started to improve his grades little by little in 2017, the second year of his debut, and took the starting position from the 2018 season. started to equalize. As a result, he announced his advance to the major leagues after leaving a great record of 884 hits, 133 home runs, and a batting average of 0.327 OPS of 0.960 in 762 career games.
Expectations were high that he would win a big contract as he had outstanding results in Japan. However, the ransom offered by the Boston Red Sox, which acquired Yoshida, exceeded expectations. Yoshida, who had not been verified on the major league stage, was presented with a 5-year, $90 million (approximately 117.6 billion won) super-large contract, and signed the contract.
Boston and Yoshida’s contract drove a big topic. Because of the large amount offered by Boston. In a situation where he didn’t even open the lid, the tag ‘overpay’ began to follow Yoshida. In an unusual interview with local media and reporters, Boston senior executives explained that Yoshida’s contract was not an ‘overpay’.
At the very beginning of the season, Yoshida swung a fire bat as if ridiculing the evaluation of ‘overpay’. However, starting with the game against the Pittsburgh Pirates on April 4 (hereinafter Korean time), his hitting sense began to drop noticeably, and at the end of the game against the Minnesota Twins on April 19, his batting average for the season plummeted to 0.167. However, this was only a temporary sluggishness and adaptation period.
Yoshida brushed off his injury and began to regain his batting feel, and in just 10 games, his batting average was raised to ‘more than 10%’. And after the start of May, his batting average rose to a high of 0.321, showing off a hot hitting feeling with 34 hits, 3 home runs, 0.351 OPS and 0.962 for the month. Following this, he failed to produce a hit in his first game in June, but has continued his good feeling by hitting in three consecutive games recently.
As can be seen from his performance, Yoshida’s major league career has been very successful. If the current trend continues, he can aim for the rookie title for the second time in 22 years after the ‘legendary’ Ichiro Suzuki. His actual grades are also approaching Ichiro. Recently, Yoshida made a record that has not been created since Ichiro.
According to ‘NESN’ on the 5th, which mainly reports Boston’s news, Yoshida is the first since Ichiro in 2001 to record less than 25 strikeouts while on base more than 85 times in the first 50 major league games since the turn of the 21st century. In 50 games in his debut season, Ichiro had 83 hits and 12 walks (eight walks, four walks) and 14 strikeouts, while Yoshida had 61 hits and 26 walks (23 walks, three walks) and 22 strikeouts.토토사이트
Currently, as of the end of the game on the 5th, Yoshida’s season batting average is 0.318, which is second in the American League. There is a difference of one penny and one li from first place Bo Bissett (Toronto Blue Jays, 0.329). First of all, Yoshida made the same record as Ichiro’s debut season in terms of 50 games. Now, Yoshida is going on a two-rabbit hunt to become the rookie of the year and the hitting king.