On the 21st, Nippon-Ham held its fourth scouting meeting of the year at ESCON. CBO Hideki Kuriyama was also in attendance, and a list of approximately 120 overall draft candidates was compiled. Assistant GM and head of scouting Takashi Obuchi gave an overview, saying, “We organized the overall picture. We barely touched on the rankings. For high school students, we narrowed down the players who should and shouldn’t be on the draft list. For college students and working professionals, we confirmed how we would view the Intercity Championships and league games.”
Regarding Stanford University’s Sasaki Rintaro, who is a candidate for selection in this fall’s draft, this was not on the agenda at this meeting. CBO Kuriyama commented, “We will confirm the rules and think within the rules. There are Japanese students at other American universities. We are moving forward while thinking about what is best for each of them in their lives. Rather than thinking about the risks, we will think about what is best for each individual player.”
Regarding this year’s trends, Director of Scouting Obuch said, “There seem to be a few high school students, and as a result, there weren’t any outstanding fielder. Players from Yokohama High School didn’t put their hands up, so I get the impression that there aren’t many top fielder.”
In addition, regarding the fastest 158 km right-hander Kendai Takasaki and Genki Ishigaki, who is from Hokkaido and is said to be the number one pitcher in high school, he said, “I wanted to see more (at Koshien). Rather, I felt that it was incomplete combustion,” he said, revealing that he would send scouts to the “32nd WBSC U18 World Cup” to start in Okinawa on September 5 and mark it closely. He also revealed that CBO Kuriyama is scheduled to visit the send-off match against the University Japan national team to be held in Okinawa on August 31st.
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AloJapan.com