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The story
In Central League play on September 27, 2026, the Yomiuri Giants cruised past the Tokyo Yakult Swallows 11-0 to snap their losing streak. Starter Shinnosuke Ogasawara held Yakult scoreless through 5 innings and even drove in a run himself, while Yuta Izumiguchi backed him up with 3 RBIs. Yakult starter Keisuke Takahashi, by contrast, walked or hit 6 batters and was charged with 7 runs before an early exit. On the thread, Takahashi’s control problems on the day drew most of the attention, alongside talk of the pennant race given Hanshin’s magic number, and a debate over just how much credit Ogasawara deserves.
Yakult 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 | 0
Giants 0 3 5 0 2 1 0 0 0 |11
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Source: nikkansports.com / Original article here
What people said
Feel bad for the Swallows fans in the stands
With 3 HBPs he should just get an automatic loss
Takahashi's hit-by-pitch rate is higher than Fujinami's
Top 3 all-time in NPB HBP rate (hit batters per inning pitched), active pitchers with 500+ innings:
1. Shuta Ishikawa
2. Keisuke Takahashi
3. Kosuke Aoyagi
"Dog, shake."
Dog:
"Woof."
Yuta Izumiguchi:
"No, dog, that's not it.
It's three. Three."
Dog:
"Woof woof woof."
Yuta Izumiguchi:
"Aww~~~ good boy, good boy, good boy." (a joke riffing on his 3 RBIs — he wants three barks to match)
Are they trying to lose on purpose?
Seriously, isn't the Central League's level just too low?
Hanshin's cooled off down the stretch too, but on paper they're still clearly the favorites…
Walk, HBP, timely hit, timely hit
Absolute trash, lol
Stop handing games to the Giants with Ogawa, Takahashi, and everyone else
No point busting out the bats after you're already out of the pennant race
This trash-tier organization
Because the Swallows set the table for them today
14 combined walks/HBPs and all
Because they finally got over their Mazda Stadium jinx (Hiroshima's home ballpark, long a house of horrors for the Giants)
He's the same as his Dragons days — a pitcher who can't build a winning record ('savings' is baseball slang for wins above .500)
10-10 is fine, all I want is for him to hold down a rotation spot all season
He's basically this team's Kuri (a nod to Hiroshima's durable innings-eater Yuki Kuri)
Score in bulk when one run would've done
The Swallows don't have any games that 'matter' anymore
The bottom three teams are all equally trash, so 4th place and 6th place are the same
Background and Key Talking Points
The biggest talking point from this game was Yakult starter Keisuke Takahashi’s control problems. Posters cited data showing his career hit-by-pitch rate ranks among the league’s highest, with some framing today’s wildness as part of a pattern rather than a one-off, though others chalked it up to simply having an off day — opinion was split. On the pennant race, posters pointed out that Hanshin has more games left and an active magic number, with the numbers suggesting that even if the Giants keep winning, the outcome largely depends on Hanshin’s results. Opinion on starter Shinnosuke Ogasawara was similarly divided, with some praising his ace-level outing and others noting that, for his career, he still hasn’t posted a winning record — suggesting one strong start alone hasn’t settled the debate.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geisoku+) thread “[Baseball] Central League: Giants 11-0 Swallows [9/27] — Giants snap losing streak, Ogasawara goes 5 scoreless innings with a timely hit of his own, Izumiguchi drives in 3, Yakult’s Takahashi hit by 6 walks/HBPs and charged with 7 runs.”
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