Yoshinobu Yamamoto (Yoshinobu Yamamoto?, Yamamoto Yoshinobu; Bizen (born August 17, 1998) is a Japanese baseball player who plays as a pitcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers of Major League Baseball (MLB).
Yamamoto made his Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) debut on August 20, 2017, three days after his nineteenth birthday, for the Orix Buffaloes. The following year, in 2018, he received his first call to participate in the Japanese All-Star Game, which was also received in 2019, the year in which his average PGL (ERA) of 1.95 was the best of that year. edition of the tournament.
In the 2021 NPB season Yamamoto managed to further lower his ERA to 1.39, again leading this statistic. He also closed that year with a record of 18-5 and with 206 strikeouts in 193 2⁄3 pitched innings, performances that earned him Pacific League MVP recognition. He was also awarded the Eiji Sawamura Award, the prize reserved for the best starting pitcher in the entire NPB. Being the pitcher with the most wins, the most strikeouts and the best ERA of the tournament led him to win the pitching triple crown. His team made it all the way to the Japan Series, which the Orix had been missing since 1996, although they lost the final series 4-2 to the Tokyo Yakult Swallows.
On June 18, 2022, he threw a no-hitter, ending a 2–0 game against the Saitama Seibu Lions without allowing any hits.[[1][[2] In 26 starts for Orix in 2022, Yamamoto posted a 15–5 mark and a 1.68 ERA with 205 strikeouts in 193 innings pitched. At the end of the season Yamamoto won both the Eiji Sawamura Award and the pitcher’s triple crown for the second consecutive season, as well as being named MVP of the Pacific League once again. That year the Orix Buffaloes won the title by beating the Tokyo Yakult Swallows 4-2 in the series.
On September 9, 2023, he threw his second career NPB no-hitter in a 4-0 win over the Chiba Lotte Marines.[[3][[4] In doing so, he became the first pitcher in NPB history to throw a no-hitter in two consecutive seasons.[[5] That year he pitched with a 1.21 ERA and was 16-6, with 169 strikeouts in 164 innings. For the third year in a row, he won the Eiji Sawamura Award, the pitcher’s triple crown, and Pacific League MVP honors. At team level, however, the Orix Buffaloes’ season ended with the defeat in the Japan Series against the Hanshin Tigers.
On November 5, 2023, the same day his team lost the decisive Game 7 of that year’s series finale (without him on the mound having pitched the previous day in the Game 6 victory), the Orix Buffaloes announced having put Yamamoto on the market with a view to a transfer to MLB.[[6]
On December 27, 2023, it was officially announced that Yamamoto would choose to accept the offer from the Los Angeles Dodgers, with whom he agreed to a 12-year contract worth a total of $325 million. The Californian franchise also had to pay a transfer fee of just over 50 million dollars to the Japanese team.[[7] Here he joined another compatriot, the star Shōhei Ōtani, who had moved to the blue and white just a few days earlier.[[8]
His MLB debut, which took place on March 21, 2024 against the San Diego Padres in Seoul as part of the MLB World Tour, was rather negative, as Yamamoto was replaced after the first inning after allowing five out of four runs allowed. valid in addition to a base for balls.[[9] The following March 30, however, he made his debut at Dodger Stadium by pitching for five innings and allowing only two hits and zero runs against five strikeouts. Even in his third game in MLB, on April 6 at the Chicago Cubs, Yamamoto did not allow any runs, again pitching for five innings and in this case allowing three hits, with eight strikeouts collected.[[10]
In the June 15 home game against the Kansas City Royals he had to leave the field after two innings with what turned out to be a sprained rotator cuff in his right shoulder. Due to this injury he was subsequently moved to the 60-day injured list.[[11] He returned to the mound on September 10, when against the Chicago Cubs he pitched four innings in which he allowed four hits and one run against eight strikeouts.[[12]
- ^ (IN) Saturday, June 18, 2022 (Scores) Seibu vs ORIXJune 18, 2022.
- ^ (IN) Yamamoto tosses 4th no-hitter of NPB seasonJune 18, 2022.
- ^ (IN) Saturday, September 9, 2023 (Scores) Lotte vs ORIXSeptember 9, 2023.
- ^ (IN) Japan’s Yamamoto throws 2nd no-hitter ahead of possible move to Major League BaseballSeptember 10, 2023.
- ^ (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamoto throws no-hitter with Yanks’ Cashman, other execs on handSeptember 9, 2023.
- ^ (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamoto throws no-hitter with Yanks’ Cashman, other execs on handSeptember 9, 2023.
- ^ (IN) Dodgers make it official, announce 12-year contract with pitcher Yoshinobu YamamotoDecember 27, 2023.
- ^ (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s Signing Is Shohei Ohtani’s First Big Win With the DodgersDecember 22, 2023.
- ^ (IN) Yamamoto chased after 1st inning of debut as Padres beat Dodgers 15-11 for 2-game South Korea splitMarch 21, 2024.
- ^ (IN) Yamamoto puts together masterpiece with 8 K’s in first MLB winApril 7, 2024.
- ^ (IN) Yamamoto moved to 60-day IL, out until at least mid-AugustJuly 14, 2024.
- ^ (IN) Yamamoto ‘better than ever’ in 8-strikeout returnSeptember 11, 2024.
- (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamotoare MLB.comMLB Advanced Media.
- (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamotoare ESPN.comESPN Internet Ventures.
- (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamotoare baseball-reference.comSports Reference LLC.
- (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamotoare fangraphs.comFangraphs Inc.
- (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamotoare The Baseball Cube.
- (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamoto (Minor), su baseball-reference.comSports Reference LLC.
- (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamotoare Olympiad.
- (IN) Yoshinobu Yamamotoare IMDbIMDb.com.
