A rare "dropped third strike" that was "unlikely expected" in advance: Looking back with a former NPB umpire

Pacific League Insight

2025.12.30(火) 08:01

Looking back at dropped third strike scene with former NPB umpire Ryo Sakai © Pacific League TV
Looking back at dropped third strike scene with former NPB umpire Ryo Sakai © Pacific League TV

dropped third strike P's UPDATE", a program to update the common knowledge of the baseball world, is now available on PERSOL Pacific League TV's official YouTube channel. Chunichi OB Masahiro Araki, Chiba Lotte Marines coach Tsuyoshi Nishioka, and former NPB umpire member Taro Ryo Sakai were invited as guests to confirm the rules of dropped third strike with video. The rules of were reviewed along with video clips.

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In the video, we check out dropped third strike in a variety of situations, from the most common to the "no swing" dropped third strike. Two of the rarest dropped third strike are presented here.

The first occurred on May 6, 2014, in a game between Fukuoka Softbank and Hokkaido Nippon-Ham. In the bottom of the ninth inning, 1-1, with one out and runners on second and third, Nobuhiro Matsuda fell to struck out but catcher deflected the ball and dropped third strike made it walk-off.

What is interesting here is that Matsuda did not run to first base. Sakai-san, who was actually at the scene, said that since there was only one out, walk-off would have been valid even if hitter was out, so there was no problem. and umpire seemed to argue among themselves, saying that if it was two outs, they would throw to first base and get an out and a change, but "(in that case) we would probably get into trouble," he said.

The second, even rarer case occurred on May 19, 2015 at Kitakyushu Municipal Baseball Stadium Fukuoka Softbank versus Orix Buffaloes, when Shunta Goto was at bat in the bottom of the seventh inning. A ball that was one bounce away from the base was hit over the signboard, and catcher ・Yusuke Takatani reached third base while looking for the ball he lost sight of.

Nishioka confirmed, "It was a play stop, right?" Nishioka confirmed. However, the umpire team, including Mr. Sakai, had already explained to both managers the local rule that if the ball was on the signboard, it was in play, so play continued. It was a very impressive incident, something that we thought would never happen.

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A rare "dropped third strike" that was "unlikely expected" in advance: Looking back with a former NPB umpire