Akihiro, the “Godzilla 2nd Generation” of the Giants: Why Anxiety Grows Behind Expectations

“You know, a fastball, ‘Pow! I have to hit it back. You have to be strong against fastballs.

On February 28, after returning to Tokyo from the Okinawa camp, Giants manager Tatsunori Hara pointed out a player by name and offered advice. The player named was second-year fielder Masato Akihiro (19). He is a gem of a player who has been called “Godzilla II,” and will carry the number “55” that Hideki Matsui wore from this season. In practice games during camp, he had 17 hits and a .353 batting average.

The leaders have high expectations for him. From the first day of camp, Shinnosuke Abe, chief operations and defense coach, has been giving him batting lessons in detention. Coaches Daisuke Motoki, Shuichi Murata, Yoshiyuki Kamei, and others watched over them with great enthusiasm. Manager Hara would not remain silent. After games, he would often call Akihiro over to give him advice such as, “You should keep your front foot closer to home,” and “You should study each pitch.

The Giants’ main players, including Hayato Sakamoto, Yoshihiro Maru, and Sho Nakata, are now in their 30s, and a generational change is urgently needed. Akihiro, who is 2 meters tall and a left-handed hitter like Hideki Matsui, is a future star candidate. During practice last March, Shigeo Nagashima, lifetime honorary manager, personally advised him, “Make sure your body is in good shape. In high school (Nishimatsu Gakusha High School), he was also a pitcher, so he was touted as a ‘two-sport athlete,’ and the Yomiuri affiliate Hochi Newspaper said he would be a starter for the season opener.

However, Akihiro is only 19 years old and in his second year of high school. He was the fifth overall pick in the draft and played in only one game last season. The leaders are taking turns coaching him, and I wonder if they will not put too much pressure on him. ……

I’m in a panic.

Similarly, Taiji Ota (now with DeNA) comes to mind as a youngster with high expectations. A big slugger who hit 65 home runs in high school and stood 188 cm tall, he was drafted first overall by the Giants in 2008 out of Tokai University Sagami High School. Manager Hara, a graduate of Tokai Sagami High School, had high expectations for him, and like Akihiro, he inherited Matsui’s number “55”. In an interview with FRIDAY (May 2006), Ota recalled his time with the team.

Why me? I was like, “I’m not going to be able to do this. I was an 18-year-old kid who had never played in the Koshien National High School Baseball Tournament, and suddenly I was the center of the media’s attention day after day. I felt like I was being crushed by the high expectations of the people around me and my impatience to become a big hitter like Matsui as soon as possible.

The pressure of being a member of the popular Giants team must have been considerable. Ota received advice from alumni both inside and outside the team, and he gradually lost sight of himself.

I received all kinds of advice from various people, and my head was in a state of panic. I lost sight of myself and could not produce results. There were times when I became more depressed than necessary and acted flustered. More than once, I cried tears of frustration behind the bench so that the other players wouldn’t see me.

Fans said, “Give me back my number 55, you pay thief!” He also received heartless yells of “I’m not a good person. In the end, Ota did not budge with the Giants and was transferred to Nippon Ham in 2004 (where he was a mainstay).

If you only listen to what others have to say, you will only get confused. It seems that the important thing for young people with high expectations is to take and choose their advice.

Hideki Matsui used to listen to the advice of various people and say, ‘Oh, yes, that’s right,’ but he mostly ignored it. The only advice he took seriously was that of Shigeo Nagashima. Ichiro during his time with the Orix was also once denied the pendulum hitting method by the leaders, but he stubbornly refused to stop. Many young players who develop into big hitters do not pander to those around them and stick to their own style,” said a reporter for a sports newspaper.

The reason why the leaders give various advices is probably out of parental love, wanting the players to become the mainstay of the team as soon as possible. What is required of Akihiro may not be the ability to listen to all advice, but rather the ability to discern what is beneficial to him.