◆ Pacific League Rakuten Eagles Nippon-Ham (April 4th, Rakuten Eagles Mobile Saikyo Park Miyagi)

Rakuten Eagles secured a decisive victory against Nippon-Ham, extending their winning streak to two games.

Starting pitcher Kenta Maeda was remarkably stable from the start. In the third inning, he received two runs of support from Nakajima's timely hit down the right field line and Tatsumi's sacrifice fly, and he gained momentum. In the fourth inning, he gave up the first hit of the day, a single to left hit to Mizuno, but he remained unfazed. He got Mizutani to hit into a double double play second base, escaping the inning. He kept putting up zeros on the scoreboard.

He continued to pitch well in the middle and later innings, holding the opponent runs through eight innings with only 90 pitches. In the ninth inning, it seemed like he might achieve his first shutout game in NPB in 12 years, since August 22, 2014, against Hanshin Tigers (at Mazda Stadium) when he was with Hiroshima. However, after a series of hits put runner from third to score, resulting in his first runs allowed. Manager Yoshii then came out of the dugout to signal his removal from the game, but he had pitched a season-high 8 2/3 innings, allowing only one runs, to earn his second win of the season. He made a strong impression that he had made a full recovery.

Manager Yoshii praised Kenta Maeda's pitch, saying it was "perfect." He explained his decision to replace Maeda after he gave runs one run, even though complete game win seemed within reach, saying, "Given his record, I didn't want him to throw any extra inning or pitches. I also think (closer) Fujihira is motivated, so I made the change at that point."