The Tazawa Watch Continues
Well, Eneos has won the Industrial League’s Tokyo Intercity Championship, mostly behind the standout pitching of ace Junichi Tazawa. Tazawa dominated his competition and was presented with the Hashido Award as the tournament’s top player. According to reports, he only hit about 91 mph on the gun in the final game, which is almost certainly attributable to his high workload during the tournament.
With the tournament over, Tazawa is now free to think about his future. He’s scheduled a press conference for September 11 where he’s expected to announce his intent to sign with an MLB team. Sponichi quoted Tazawa as saying “It (the tournament) has just ended… I’ll think it over from now” and “I want to test my strength overseas”.
Needless to say, there’s been an explosion of coverage on this in the Japanese press. Several MLB teams have reportedly sent scouts to watch Tazawa, while the Braves have sent GM Frank Wren and the Tigers have sent Dick Egan, special assistant to GM Dave Dombrowski. The consensus favorite to land Tazawa still seems to be the Red Sox, but we’ll see what happens.
Don’t touch that dial…
10/09/2008 at 1:17 am Permalink
Yeah, we saw him in the semi-finals and he wasn’t nearly as dominant as before, but what do you expect after going through a Koshien-like workload?
I was gonna point you to mainichi since nichibei movement isn’t my thing, but it seems you’ve seen the articles already. I’ll write up Monday’s game sometime soon, though probably focus on the Honda cheerleaders and an uppity sidearming 34-year-old pitcher/coach that intrigued me. This entire thing depresses me too much (though I am proud that my Chono curse is still in effect).
Whatever, we’ll get Tazawa on the Fighters in a few years anyway I’m sure 😛