Japanese presentation about the Hanshin Tigers for a group of fans? Check.
Hanshin Tigers proficiency test (expert level) with little preparation? Check.
How to cap off the weekend? Easy. Fulfill one of the rewards of the H-TEN Kickstarter Campaign: a day at Koshien with T-Ray. One kind soul, Mr. Stephen Greene (CEO of RockCorps), generously gave to the cause, and on Sunday, he cashed in.
Oh boy, did he ever. The Tigers faced off against the Yokohama DeNA BayStars, and improved their season series record to 14-5 on the year. That’s actually not too far off the final score in this one, either: the home boys walloped the fallen stars 12-3 in front of a jubilant crowd that included us, plus a friend, plus another supporter and his wife (sitting several rows below us).
Two key plays came in the fifth, when Shunsuke hit a bases-clearing “triple” (I’ll let you decide if it was a three-bagger or not), as seen here:
走者一掃！俊介のタイムリースリーベースでこの回5点目！！！ #hanshin #虎テレ pic.twitter.com/TcQ3HdB7Vm
— 阪神タイガース (@TigersDreamlink) September 2, 2018
And then a Naomasa Yohkawa home run ground-rule triple (?) in the sixth.
これは・・・
陽川ホームラン❓ pic.twitter.com/fqTtjuhipr— 虎大和(浜)9/16,17(神宮)9/19,10/7 (@yamatotoratora) September 2, 2018
After the game, Stephen and T-Ray talked about the matchup specifically, and then hung out at Mizuno Square shooting the breeze about fatherhood, work, baseball, and we even recorded an interview for an upcoming podcast episode. For now, here’s the postgame report:
What a weekend for T-Ray. I can’t say my time away from the team was hard (this has not exactly been a banner year so far), but it sure was nice to feel the yellow and black coursing through my veins from Friday to late into the night on Sunday!