Shoulder-High Fastball? No Problem for Yang Yao-Hsun
How do you pitch to someone who’s hot zone is triple the size of everybody else? The Lamigo Monkeys’ pitcher turned positional player 陽耀勳 (Yang Yao-Hsun) has once again shown his ability to hit anything out of the strike zone for a base hit.
It happened on March 15, in the exhibition game between the Lamigo Monkeys and the NPB’s Chiba Lotte Marines. It was top of the second, runners on first and third and two outs. The Lotte pitcher threw a 142kph fastball at shoulder-high, and Yang Yao-Hsun crushed it almost to the warning track for an RBI double.
Chaotic Batting Style: Yang Yao-Hsun
In Taiwan, there is a term for this type of hitter, 亂打流 (Luan-Da-Liu) which means Chaotic Batting Style. Apart from Yang Yao-Hsun, his fellow Monkeys’ teammates 郭嚴文 (Kuo Yen-Wen) is also known for that.
Below are some videos of the Chaotic Batting Master Yang Yao-Hsun doing his magic in the CPBL. High and low, there’s no problem for Yang.
Not often you see a left-handed batter crush the high pitch. For whatever reason, left-handed hitters tend to be low ball hitters and right-handed hitters tend to be high-ball hitters. Except like here, when the normal rules don’t hold.
Yang is an interesting player, I still hope to see him returns to the mound. He was a legit LHP back in his healthy day. Pitched in the NPB, Pirates’ Double-A and even shutdown the KBO All-Star in the 2013 WBC as well. It just all of sudden, he can’t throw anyway.