"Straight Talk" is a regular feature in which The Sporting Tribune's John E. Gibson offers a full translation of media availability with Dodgers Japanese stars Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki. He will also help translate when Lakers star Rui Hachimura and LA Galaxy captain Maya Yoshida are asked questions in Japanese.
The job of interpreters in the heat of the moment is difficult without the ability to write down questions and answers and re-hear responses for proper context. That's where John comes in to help. John currently works as a Japanese-English interpreter and covered pro baseball in Japan for about 20 years. His experience as a sports reporter includes stints at The Orange County Register, The Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, The Redlands Daily Facts, The Yomiuri Shimbun’s English newspaper in Tokyo and The Epoch Times.
LOS ANGELES – Dodgers starter Roki Sasaki (1-2) rides his forkball into the sixth inning, going that deep for the first time this season, and allows four runs – including three homers – but earns win No. 1 this season by slowing down a hot team on Saturday at home. Los Angeles beats Chicago 12-4 to snap the Cubs' 10-game winning streak as Sasaki allowed seven hits and walks one, while striking out five.
Q: Roki, you threw way more splitters this start than you have all your starts previously. What led to that?
Sasaki: Today, I had good control of it, and it was a good pitch to use to build the counts, so I think it was an easy to pitch to call for.
Q: You were also throwing it harder. Did you tweak something in between starts to throw it harder?
Q: Is it similar to anything that you have been doing with the splitter before, like when you pitched in Japan?
Q: How would you evaluate where you are right now, in terms of your evolution being back in the rotation?
Sasaki: Evaluate? Well, I haven’t been able to eat up a lot of innings, and the way I’ve been pitching hasn’t been great, so that bothers me. But I’m doing all the things I can do at the moment. I can’t control how I’m evaluated at the end of the season, so I’m just going to keep doing my best and concentrate on that.
Q: Is that the next step, just getting deeper into games?
Sasaki: The results are the results. I simply want to think about what I need to do to get to that point.
Q: When you look at the command, and just the better efficiency today, was this the best you’ve felt in a start this year?
Sasaki: Well, yes, it was good. The control on my fork was also good so I felt overall like this was the easiest pitch to use to work the count, and that was a positive. Also, I’m starting to feel my form is better, so I hope I can improve it even more.
Q: When you came off the mound, there was kind of a big cheer. How encouraged were you about that cheering after that?
Sasaki: Well, yeah, I allowed four runs, so the offense was there and the other pitchers helped me out, but coming off the mound to the cheers, I felt like I wanted to do well next time I get out there.
Q: How important is it for your splitter to work the way that it did tonight for like the rest of your pitch mix to be effective?
Sasaki: It will mean guys can’t sit on the fastball. That’s the biggest thing.
Q: Are you a fan of bobbleheads, and what do you think of yours?