Lost in all the hub bub surrounding Masahiro Tanaka's undefeated season is the fact that Chihiro Kaneko of the Orix Buffaloes is having a pretty damn good season himself. Kaneko has gone 14-8 this year with an ERA of 1.96 for a not particularly good team. He actually has actually given up fewer hits this year in more innings pitched than Tanaka and has more strikeouts than him also. He's walked about 25 more guys though and given up three more home runs.
Kaneko pitched today. I suspect that he'll pitch one of the two games that the Eagles and Buffaloes are making up next weekend (during the First Stage of the Climzx Series). It might be cool if he and Tanaka faced off in one of the games but I would be stunned if Tanaka appears in either of the games with the Final Stage starting the following Thursday.
Here's Kaneko's rookie card from the 2005 BBM 1st Version set (#202):
1 comment:
Yeah, it's been a really nice bounceback season for Kaneko. But with Tanaka in full beast mode all season it's easy to get lost in the shuffle, just ask Kenta Maeda
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