Yuki Matsuoka of the University of Tokyo, who gave up the career of baseball and chose a job (1)
Practice scene of the University of Tokyo baseball team
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In recent years, attention has been focused on the competitive performance of the University of Tokyo baseball team. Looking only at their results, they have been at the bottom of the Tokyo Six Universities League for 26 years and 52 consecutive seasons until last fall, but they are on a par with the other five schools in the Six Universities, which have draft candidates and players with Koshien experience. The number of matches is increasing.
The person who symbolizes the level-up of the University of Tokyo is pitcher Yuki Matsuoka, who played a major role in last year’s team. The right-hander, who can throw fastballs from his petite body of 172 cm, was also an elite IQ player from Komaba Toho High School, which produces more than 50 students who pass the University of Tokyo every year. Over the course of four episodes, he delves into the baseball life of an “unusual ace”. (Ryoichi Yazaki: Freelance journalist)
[Episode 2]Why is the University of Tokyo baseball team getting stronger? The idea of doing things while thinking about it
[Episode 3]How did Matsuoka, who is not blessed with a strong physique, come to be able to hit a ball speed of nearly 150 km/h?
[Episode 4]What is more important than a total record of 1 win and 14 losses, a shift in values that led to personal growth
At the end of the season last fall, in the press room behind the back net at Jingu Stadium, an amateur baseball reporter for a sports newspaper was having the following conversation.
“Doesn’t Yuki Matsuoka of the University of Tokyo have any intention of continuing to play baseball? It’s a waste, isn’t it?”
“When it comes to the University of Tokyo, you probably won’t be able to get a job at a company in that area, but wouldn’t it have been better to work at Nantoka Heavy Industries, which has a baseball club, or Nanchara East Japan?”
A few days earlier, the career paths of the fourth-year members of the University of Tokyo club after graduation were made public on social media. In Matsuoka’s column, “Development Bank of Japan” was listed.
Although the name may be unfamiliar to the average office worker, the Development Bank of Japan is a policy financial institution funded by the government and managed by the Ministry of Finance.By using advanced financial methods, it is highly public interest and private financial institution. The company’s business focuses on providing funds to customers who require long-term business funds that would be difficult for institutions to provide on their own. It is a government-affiliated financial institution that resembles a public institution.
There is no baseball club that belongs to so-called “amateur baseball”. In other words, Matsuoka made the choice to quit baseball at university. That was the topic of discussion among reporters.
Matsuoka is the University of Tokyo’s ace who started in either the first or second game of all 10 spring/autumn league games last year and competed against famous aces from other universities. His fastball speed is consistently measured in the 140km/h range.
When you think of the “Tokyo University ace,” you have the image of a skilled pitcher who makes full use of his pitching skills. In reality, there are many strong baseball schools across the country that claim to be competitive in both literary and military arts, but there are only a limited number of high schools that can produce students who pass the University of Tokyo, and of course there is no recommendation for sports at the University of Tokyo.
If that happens, there is a very small chance that players who have been well-prepared since high school will enroll, as they do at other powerful universities. The only way to improve your performance is through your efforts after joining the team, but four years is a bit short for that.
Therefore, the reality is that in order to suppress the batter in front of you and win the game, you have no choice but to focus on technique (ball control and breaking balls) rather than pursuing ball speed.
Still, there are some pitchers who don’t fit into that framework. Takuhiro Matsuya (formerly Nippon Ham, who enrolled in 2001) was the fastest pitcher in the history of the University of Tokyo at the time, measuring 146 km, and was two years older than other good pitchers of the “Matsuzaka generation” such as Waseda University’s Tsuyoshi Wada (currently Softbank). I threw it at each other.
After Matsuie, pitchers who can clear 140km have occasionally appeared at the University of Tokyo. Possible reasons for this include the spread of weight training and research into pitching form through motion analysis.
Recently, Kohei Miyadai (former Yakult, enrolled in 2014) crossed the 150km barrier in his third year, and became the first pitcher from the University of Tokyo to be selected to represent Japan in the Japan-America Collegiate Baseball Tournament in 33 years since Kensuke Okoshi (current announcer). has been done.
Kohei Miyadai played an active role with Nippon Ham and Yakult. The University of Tokyo baseball team surpassed the 150km barrier for the first time in its history (Photo: Kyodo News)
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Matsuoka has also had a fastball speed of over 140 km since he was a sophomore, and although his type is different from Matsuya and Miyadai, he can be said to be a successor in this lineage.
However, the two aforementioned pitchers were rare in the Tokyo University baseball team, and had received a fair amount of attention since their high school days. On the other hand, Matsuoka has no track record in so-called “high school baseball.” That’s because he played softball until high school.
2024-01-13 21:13:14
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