Lotte's Ryusei Terachi, in his second year since graduating from high school, made the most of the few opportunities he had this season, playing in 116 games and finishing with a batting average of .256, Home Run, and 33 RBI.
After the regular season ended, during batting practice at the October fall training held at Zozo Marine Stadium, he started out by holding the bat a little shorter and not stepping, then after a while he held the bat a little shorter and raised his leg to hit, and then he held the bat a little longer and raised his leg to hit, trying out a variety of different hitting styles.
When asked why, he explained, "When I'm not stepping, I can pull the ball in and confirm that I can hit it at a good spot for me, so I just focus on creating a solid no-step axis so that my axis doesn't waver when I raise my foot, and then holding the bat short and compactly to hit the ball. Rather than doing this specifically in a game, I focus on practicing so that I can keep my axis solid with my foot raised without wavering."
During batting practice in the fall, he hit the ball at various times.
"I think that now is the only time we can check things like, 'What would happen if I lifted my leg at this timing?' So I think that now we can check in various places things like, 'This is what happened when the pitcher lifted his leg at this timing,' 'It would have been better if it had been at this timing,' or 'Conversely, it wouldn't have worked if it had been at this timing,' so I'm also working on that kind of thing."
He was practicing batting while thinking about next season. The autumn camp in Miyakonojo has ended, and the off-season has officially begun.
During last year's off-season, in terms of batting, he said, "I want to overcome my weaknesses, so when batting, I try to imagine hitting the ball on the inside and hitting it from the inside," and he worked hard on his own challenges.
This offseason, he said, "In terms of batting, I found my style and what I needed to do during the fall camp," so rather than overcoming challenges, he is focusing on what he needs to do.
"There are other left-handed hitter, such as Togashi (of DeNA), with whom I plan to do voluntary training, so I'd like to first listen to what they have to say and think about whether it suits my style, and then I'd like to get into batting."
Looking ahead to next season, he vowed to improve his level and "achieve better batting results than this year."
Interview and text by Yuta Iwashita
