NMI Junior League All Stars manager Vinnie Sablan who had earlier admitted that Guam, Philippines and Indonesia are all tough teams to beat, has put Harry Nakamura on top of the line up.
Nakamura is Saipan Junior Little League’s pitching leader with 2.42 ERA. Coming next to him is Joe Palacios who gave up 23 strike outs in the regular season.
The Philippine All Stars have taken their lost to Hawaii during last year’s World Series a big lesson to learn.
Coach Alberto Catangui attributed last year’s lost to lack of pitcher in the championship game.
In an interview yesterday he recalled that they basically ran out of pitcher in the final game, as Yusuke Kuroda reached the maximum pitch count even before the championship came.
Their next best pitcher, Adrian Bernardo however, managed to pitched a straight five innings and was able to hold Hawaii, 2-1 in the fifth.
Keeping that in mind, the Philippine Junior All Stars, Catangui said have been setting their might on shutting their opponent out with “a very good pitching.”
The Manila team, he said were also used to playing taller opponents so it’s no longer a problem to them. Besides, baseball is not about the height.
He expressed confident that his team had very good group of batters, so the rest of their concentration goes to fielding and they believe they can achieve that with magnificent pitchers on board.
Indonesia’s Junior All Stars team also has “the most extra ordinary average in pitching,” according to Achmad Juanda Nugraha, Indonesia’s Little League’s assistant district administrator.
He knows that the League in Junior division is very strict in pitch count. A threshold of 21 pitch count per game is one of the things they are preparing themselves for.
All they have to do is give out as many strike outs as possible before they reach the maximum pitch count.
Indonesia was not able to participate last year’s Asia-Pacific meet but Nugraha recalled their Junior League won the championship in 2006.
Everybody in the team this year are new, he said but the training program they gave them is the same the 2006 champions had during their time.
