Winning and non-winning managers
Manager Tatsunami is in the final year of a three-year contract and is said to be the third year in which results are needed.
In order to build a winning team, the manager needs to be aware of the team’s current situation and reinforce its weaknesses. Therefore, a two-year contract would be too short.
However, a contract longer than three years is unnecessary. The manager needs to show some results in the third year, and depending on those results, team can consider renewing his contract.
Manager Tatsunami has committed that he will change the Dragons into a winning team with a winning habit. However, looking at the strategy of the games so far, we feel that he is a ‘self-satisfied manager who does not care about winning or losing’.
In other words, I feel that his goal is to play the games as the manager with the member he has chosen.
There are three reasons why I feel as described above.
1. not caring if they win or lose.
Several games had the same situation by May 2024.
For example, the same thing happened twice: in the eighth inning when losing by one run. There was a runner in scoring position with two outs, but the next batter was the inexperienced Tanaka who had a low batting average. I thought he would use a pinch hitter because this was an important phase for team to win. However, he did not use a pinch-hitter and the eighth innings ended without scoring a run.
It is also an inning in the second half (sixth or seventh innings) of a similar situation where we are losing by one run.
With one out, a runner is hit by a pitch. The next batter was Kinoshita, whose batting average was about 140., but manager Tatsunami directed Muramatsu whose batting average was over .300, to bunt to advance the runner.
From this strategy, I thought he would use a pinch hitter. However, he did not use a pinch-hitter and this innings ended without scoring a run.
Of course, these games were lost.
2. use the players he want to use rather than the players in their best condition
Many managers of teams with no fixed regulars say that they will use the players who are in the best condition at the time.
However, Muramatsu who kept a high batting average in the 2024 pre-season games, was not used in the starting line-up for the opening three games, and Rodriguez who did not hit well in the 2024 pre-season games, was used. As a result, team lost two and drew one in the opening three games.
After that, for some reason, players with low batting averages are used in front of the clean-up batter and Muramatsu who has a high batting average, has continued to be used in the bottom of the batting order.
This type of strategy has not changed since last year !
Three consecutive wins by consecutive performances by Usami gave the team its first four-game winning streak of the year, and the mood was set for a big win streak. However, on the day of the game for the fourth straight win, Kinoshita was called up, Kinoshita was used in the starting line-up instead of Usami. In the end, team could not win this game, and also suffered a big losing streak afterwards.
3. the catcher issue
As others may have felt, I wrote after the end of last year’s season that “the Dragons’ weaknesses are the poor batting line-up and the catcher”.
However, manager Tatsunami’s strategy seems to be that he thinks the catcher’s defense is not particularly important.
Did manager Tatsunami think that the catcher did not need to prevent stolen bases? In other words, does the his strategy mean that team does not need to take precautions against the opposing team’s runners?
TV commentary said that ‘the pitch selections of the Dragons are read by opponent team’. In fact, there have been many cases where they have been hit in a pinch or hit in a series. This pitch selection issue has not changed at all since last year.
However, the manager does not seem to be considerate about the main catcher. By the way, the main catcher has not been able to prevent stolen bases and has a batting average of .140, so what does the manager Tatsunami want in a catcher?
From all this, we can only think that manager Tatsunami thinks that the team’s wins and losses, i.e. the wishes of the fans, are not important.
If the manager Tatsunami really wants to win, he should change his strategy to greedily go for points.
Thanks.