Eri Yoshida, who two years ago became the first woman to play professional baseball in her native Japan, is back in the USA. After spending last season with the Chico Outlaws of the Golden League (followed by a stint in the Arizona Winter League), she'll be pitching for Samurai All Japan, an all-Japanese team in the Southern California-based Western Baseball Association.

Yoshida is now throwing the ball from a three-quarters arm slot (about 50 cm higher than before) instead of her previous side-arm slot. Said Yoshida, "I've pitched [professionally] for 2 years now and I needed to change something. I was walking a lot of batters throwing from the side. I've changed [my mechanics] to something where I can throw a lot of knuckleballs free and easy."

It seems the new arm slot has also added about 10km/h to her pitches (she's now throwing anywhere from the mid 110km/h range to close to 120km/h).

yakyubaka