On the 16th, Lotte announced that Shuta Ishikawa will be starting in the practice game against The Giants on the 17th.

Shuta Ishikawa commented through the team, "Playing in a real game at this time will help me understand where I am at. One thing is to understand what kind of performance I can give given the flow of the game and the feeling of the game. I also want to focus on results. I want to produce something that will make the people watching think, 'I'm in good shape,' and I think I have to produce that."

"The manager has said that it's a competition, so I'll keep that in mind and throw in a way that will allow me to get good results. Things have been going well so far, and I feel like I'm pitching well, so I'd like to do even better on mound in a real game. I also have some breaking ball that I feel are very accurate, so I'd like to hone those in real games. I want to throw with all my heart," he said with determination.