The 2026 season is about to begin for Kazuya Ojima of the Lotte Marines.
Kojima reached the required innings pitched for the fifth consecutive year last season, but said, "I dropped out midway through, and I didn't have any good games, so it was a somewhat frustrating season," finishing with an 8-10 record and a 3.72 ERA.
"Of course, I want to improve my individual performance, but I also want the team to win the league championship. First of all, I want to be able to pitch for the entire year without missing a game, and I also want to do my best to achieve career-high numbers," he said, after participating in the autumn practice held at Zozo Marine Stadium and the Miyakonojo Autumn Camp, where he worked up a sweat.
During his off-season training period, he said, "Last year, I tried changing my form in an attempt to increase my speed, but it didn't feel right, and I also injured my lower back. I spent time properly healing my back, and I've been reflecting on the training I used to do and applying that knowledge. So far, I feel like I'm in good shape." He had a fulfilling time during this period.
On the reason for the lack of ball speed in his search for fastball speed last year, he said, "In the end, I was told that to speed up the ball, the angle should be at what degree, and I was told many things about the driveline and so on, but I gave too much priority to that rather than my feeling and kept on doing that even though it didn't feel right to me. I kept doing that, even though it didn't feel right to me. I thought that throwing a sharp 145 km/h was better for me than throwing 150 km/h. I would like to have more speed, but it would be better if I had more speed. It would be even better if I had more speed, but that's the way I feel about it.
He often used slider and change-up as his finishing pitches, but last season he used a variety of pitches as his finishing pitches. Even though it was a tough season, perhaps it was a positive thing in terms of having more pitches in his repertoire.
"Last year, pitch was really just a makeshift job. I didn't feel like I was pitching with much confidence, but I don't think what I did during that time was a negative thing, and I want to work hard this year so that I can say it wasn't a negative thing."
During the Miyakonojo training camp in February, he threw more pitches in bullpen than usual, throwing 85 pitches on the 3rd and 115 pitches on the 6th. When asked about his intentions, he said, "Since turning pro, I've tried to throw as few pitches as possible in bullpen, and I've almost never thrown more than 50 pitches, but last year's numbers didn't feel quite right to me. I had a set routine, but I thought it might be good to break that and try something I don't usually do. I was always on the side that threw a lot of pitches in both high school and bullpen. I think the only time I can throw that many pitches is during training camp, so I threw a lot."
After making his first appearance in an outing this season in a practice game against DeNA on February 19, he pitched 3 runs innings against Korea Lotte on March 1, 4 runs in an educational league game against DeNA on March 8, 4 runs in an open game against Seibu Lions on March 15, and 6 runs in an open game against Chunichi on March 22.
"My numbers in the preseason games haven't been great, so there are some things that make me uneasy, but it's not like I've been doing things blindly and not getting results. I don't want to use (the things I've tried) as an excuse, but I don't feel like I've just been doing my best without any real effort and this is the result." BB and runs allowed were noticeable, the fact that he was able to try out various things in preparation for the start of the season is a positive thing.
pitch I'm going to think about how I can throw the inning I've been entrusted with for as long as possible," he said. Many fans are anxious about the pitch results of the February and March international games, but we hope that they will be drowned out.
Interview and text by Yuta Iwashita
