A Quote by Masahiro Tanaka

For me, it's just going up on the mound and trying to get outs. — © Masahiro Tanaka
For me, it's just going up on the mound and trying to get outs.
The only time I really try for a strikeout is when I'm in a jam. If the bases are loaded with none out, for example, then I'll go for a strikeout. But most of the time I try to throw to spots. I try to get them to pop up or ground out. On a strikeout I might have to throw five or six pitches, sometimes more if there are foul-offs. That tires me. So I just try to get outs. That's what counts - outs. You win with outs, not strikeouts.
Sometimes, with two strikes and two outs, I step off the mound. People are yelling, they're yelling really loud. I step off because I want to feel it. You've got all that adrenaline going, you've got that rush. People think I'm thinking about something, but I'm just trying to listen to everyone and feed off it.
Yeah, strikeouts just kind of happen. It's not something I'm trying to do, I'm just trying to get outs as fast as possible.
My hand is very tired but I want to go on writing. I keep resting and thinking. All day I have been two people - the me imprisoned in yesterday and the me out here on the mound; and now there is a third me trying to get in - the me in what is going to happen next.
If you're a pitcher, and you're pitching and you strike me out and you start celebrating on the mound and showing me off, whenever I get a hit off you, I'm going to go and celebrate, and you shouldn't get mad. If you're a pitcher and strike me out and show me respect and you don't show me up, when I get a homer or a hit, I'm not going to show you up. That's what I believe.
Believe me, I would much rather get three outs on three pitches than three outs on nine pitches, because that's going to make me that much stronger at the end of the game. My pitching philosophy is simpe. I believe in getting the ball over the plate and not walking a lot of men.
You feel like a stud out there when people swing and miss. As I've gotten older, I've preached to our young guys that strikeouts are sexy, but outs are outs, man, no matter how you get them. It's a lot cooler for me pitching in the seventh or eighth inning than it is going 5 1/3. Your manager likes it a lot more, too.
I may not get a hit, but you'll see me playing hard. You see my outs, they will be quality outs.
When you get out there on the mound, you've got what you've got, and you got to figure out a way to get outs.
I'm just going to keep working. Spend more days in the gym, as possible. Just trying to get my game up, and just keep playing. And if it's in God's will for me to win, then I'll get it.
I don't care how you get the outs. It doesn't matter to me how bad it looks, how good it looks, how many strikeouts you have. None of that stuff matters as long as you get the outs.
I think it go serious in college when I found out I really enjoyed making people laugh. It makes me happy. I said, I wanna be a comedian, I wanna get good.' You're not good in the beginning. You're still trying to figure out what the things are that you are going to talk about, what your angle is going to be and there's a lot of trial and error. I just never gave up and that was the beginning of my career. Just experimenting, trying it out and falling in love with it.
Initially, it (winning the 1967 American League Pennant) was what you would dream about in Little League. The winning pitcher, being on the mound to win the pennant, everyone congratulating me. But a few minutes later, you realize you're not going where you want to go. I was trying to get back in the dugout. Thank God for the Boston police, they were able to control the crowd. It was delirium.
I'm me on the mound. I like to show my emotion, be real aggressive and give everything I've got for one half inning. I don't have to act. What you see on the mound is what I am in real life.
In so many ways, it feels the same now when I play as the very first time I picked up the instrument. There's always this sound out there that's just a little bit beyond my reach and I'm trying to get there and that just sort of keeps me going.
I remember one time going out to the mound to talk with Bob Gibson. He told me to get back behind the batter; that the only thing I knew about pitching was that it was hard to hit!
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