Yangdai Steel retires from the competition, Kuriyama Hideki and other mentors and teammates send blessings via video

Yangdai Steel held its retirement match today, and the post-match retirement ceremony, including supervisor Hideki Kuriyama, sent blessings to his 21-year career through videos.

The 39-year-old famous player who lives in Japan will retire today. After the game, the retirement ceremony will show the blessing videos of nine people including his former mentors and teammates, including the supervisors of two important stages of Yang Daiko’s baseball career in Japan, from his mentor Masahiro Hiramatsu at Fukuoka Daiichi High School, to his supervisor Hideki Kuriyama who reached the peak of his career in Nippon Ham. They all sent blessings to him through the video for his 21-year career.

This video almost connects the story of Yoshidaiko's baseball life in Japan. In addition to Masahiro Hiramatsu and Hideki Kuriyama, former Ham teammates Takahiro Imami, Yuki Saito, Kenji Sugitani, and Sho Nakata, as well as Giants teammates Hisayoshi Nagano, Yuto Sakamoto, and current Hams second-team director Atsuki Inaba also sent their blessings to Yoshidaiko through the video.

Yang Dai Steel and Hiramatsu Masahiro share the same love as father and son. When talking about this high school mentor in the past, he once said: "I came to Japan from Taiwan when I was more than 10 years old and received the guidance of Mr. Hiramatsu Masahiro at Fukuoka Daiichi High School. I think it was because of this that I was able to embark on the path of becoming a professional baseball player. To this day, I am still very grateful to him."

At the retirement ceremony, when his mentor Masahiro Hiramatsu appeared in the video, Yang Daigang was moved and bowed his head and wiped away tears frequently.

If Hiramatsu witnessed the beginning of Yangdai's steel career in Japan, Hideki Kuriyama accompanied him through the most dazzling years in Ham. Kuriyama took over the reins of the Hams in 2012, and Yang Daigang also started serving as the first pitcher and center fielder that year. Not only did he play in 144 games for the first time, but he also won the first career Gold Glove Award for outfielders. The next year, he hit a career-high 18 home runs and stole 47 bases, winning the American League stolen base title. He gradually became a star with both strength and popularity in the Hams.

Kuriyama even spoke highly of Adai Ko's fielding ability in the center field. He once praised his fielding ability as "the best in Japan today." He believed that Ako not only had a wide range of defense, but also had excellent movement speed after judging high fly balls. He even compared him with Yoshio Itoi and bluntly said that Ako was "half a step faster."

From Masahiro Hiramatsu, who led him to take root in the Japanese baseball world in high school, to Hideki Kuriyama, who accompanied him through the peak of his career in Ham, now two important supervisors at different stages have appeared in the retirement blessing video, and they have also connected the important trajectory from the starting point to the peak of Yangdai Steel's 21-year career.