Getting up to date

After having been away for two weeks I come back to find the Tigers in fifth place and still struggling. When I left the Tigers were trying to find a way to avoid a series sweep at Tokyo Dome - they didn't and an ignominious end to Imanari's first series as catcher against the Giants was assured. It also ended Wada's dreams of reaching .500 before the start of the All Star break. Given Wada's management inability this was a tall order anyway. Tigers next home series against the Dragons was acutally surprising and showed the team could play well and produce tight series wins. The first game was particularly impressive - a 1-0 win ground out in true Dragons style. The second was a defeat but the third was a win 4-1 with some nice batting by Arai and Yamato. The Swallows series saw one game rained off and one victory to the Swallows and one to the Tigers. The good point about this series was the use of the sacrifice fly by Tigers - it took long enough. Bunting is down as well which can only be a good thing. The final series at Koshien, though, was a humilation. Tigers fans can put up with a lot of things but being thrashed 2-0-1 by the Giants at their home ground is not one of them. Sakai-owner had to leave the stadium by a different exit to avoid angry Tigers fans.

On the player front Nohmi is now being rested because of fatigue. This was anticipatable early in the season and Wada's failure to pay attention to pitch counts here is mainly to blame. Yamato is proving to be very useful but Wada is now playing him at two not at seven - this is wasting his RBI potential. Hirano is being played at seven but one wouldn't have thought that the position is suitable. Imanari is being favoured for catcher nowadays though he is not as good a catcher as Komiyama. There are two factors in play here - he does have a better bat and he is an outsider. Tigers management do have an aversion to homegrown catchers but now have a significant shortage. Interestingly with all this shortage neither Asai nor Kanoh have been reconverted to catchers. This is typical stupid stubborness and very representative of the thinking that goes on in the Tigers organisation. Kanoh, in particular, wants to catch and given the need Tigers have for catchers one would have thought that this desire could have been utilised. One idiocy that is being mooted around is the possiblity that Craig Brazell will not be asked back next year. This is typical Japanese baseball - blame the foreigner. Brazell is the second highest producer of RBIs in the side which is generally underperforming. One cannot see his removal being conducive to an improvement in performance at all. On the Fujii front - the recovery is taking a long time and seems to suggest a problem far more serious than has been revealed. Fujii needs to go anyway but these health problems cannot be considered as insignificant.

So the deduction is that Wada is as out of his depth as ever and that his team of coaches add nothing to the mix. The trouble Sakai-owner has been encountering from the fans though is significant. It suggests deep fan dissatisfaction and if it is harnessed properly could lead to Wada retiring through health grounds and a new manager coming in. Wada needs to improve drastically during the second season.