Japanese Baseball NPB Draft Analysis - Kazuya Takahori - Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles
ByKazuya Takahori - Pitcher - Mitsubishi Okazaki
DOB : 6/11/87 
age : 22
throws / hits : R / R
height cm : 183
weight kg : 70
height inch : 72.0 Rakuten Golden Eagles
weight lbs : 154.3 round 4
Kazuya Takahori is a forkball pitcher who can also put zip on his velocity and has nice life on his fastball. He hails from the industrial league, but is still only 22 years old. Currently, his only weak point is his command. He can be slightly off target at times but overall he is fairly polished and accomplished with a good set of pitches. He also has the smarts to pace a game and is good at the strategic part of pitching. Takahori is a strikeout artist, K-ing batters by going after them aggressively. He uses his body very well and his slider drops off right before the batter. Takahori feel under the radar but could end up being Rakuten’s most valuable and best pitcher in this draft.
Outlook: Takahori will replace the struggling Arime in middle relief by the latest 2012. He still needs to develop his off-speed pitches better and work on his placement a bit, but he is not far from being one of the more reliable middle relief pitchers in Japanese pro baseball. A different style, but I see him as a reliable rock in relief like Yomiuri’s Yamaguchi. Takahori can go long in relief or short as a set-up man. He can also spot start as a 5th or 6th starter. This is Rakuten’s best pick of the draft and he is a better pitcher than their #1 pick Tomura. I would not even be surprised to see Takahori play in 2010, he is already polished and almost ready.
Brandon Siefken has covered Japanese pro and amateur baseball since 1991. He is currently an intern for a Major League Baseball team and has been quoted in Bloomberg, The New York Times and other publications regarding Japanese baseball. Brandon is a regular writer for Bob Bavasi’s JapanBall.com site and has authored several articles including “The Kuroda Index” and “Yu Darvish: A 315 Pitch Scouting Report.”
Each year Brandon publishes the “Japan Baseball News Weekly” ( http://www.japanbaseballnews.com/?page_id=1543 ) with updated weekly stats for every player from April to October. Brandon can be contacted at brandon@japanball.com.
