Soft Tank Hawks

I ain't in Japan as well, but from what I see, none of the Hawks are hitting the ball well, besides Ohmura and Kokubo of late. One other person they miss much could be Kawasaki. He does a lot of things in that no. 2 hole, connecting between the lead-off and the clean-up. And he's been out for a long time already.

The bullpen's also to be blamed, with no one other than Mahara and Nitkowski doing their job properly. Their middle relievers have been blowing saves since day 1.

Matsunaka's got to pick up his form - batting just .249 after 60 games. Tamura, after that hot start, is not doing quite that well also. But as you said, it's only 60 games into the season, and if they pick up their slack, they do have a team with potential of winning it all. Let's see what unfolds in the future.

I am new at this. I'd been a baseball fan for just over a year. I fell in love with SoftBank Hawks the first time I saw their game last year with the Giants and Kazumi Saitoh was their pitcher. Since then, I started learning the rules of the game and almost everything about Hawks.

The problem is, I don't understand Nihongo very much. I can't read Japanese characters, so I have to research for an English version of the games and everything. You can say that I'm one of the crazy Hawks fans.

From what I saw last year, I think they are unbelievably good. That's why I got so heartbroken when they lost the playoffs. I think they really, really need to get Kazumi Saitoh back in the roster. But what I don't understand most is why would they be playing this bad? I mean, they went to spring training before the season started, right? They started really, really good this season. I don't believe that it's because they don't have Saitoh in the line-up. Saitoh would just play 1 game every week. I think he could only make a difference on that day.

Kawasaki, on the other hand, has been a huge loss when he was recovering from his accident. He can make a lot of difference since he is playing almost every inning everyday. I'm glad to see him back and I can't wait for him to play like he used to.

Would you happen to know, when will Saitoh66 be back in the line-up? I miss him sooooo much and I can't take anymore lost games. I'm in the Philippines right now and nobody here gets me. So if I'm crying after every lost game, they would just laugh at me. Baseball is not a very popular game here, especially Japanese baseball.

Oh, by the way, thank you for this site. It will make a huge difference to me.

The Hawks have some big holes in their batting order. Morale is a big factor in how the batting has become worse. If you hit the ball only to have some weak batters pop up or strike out, you'll feel bad about it. Imagine that multiplied many times over for an entire season. Same goes for the bullpen blowing leads. It changes the morale of the batting order.