On April 3, 2023, Masataka Yoshida crushed his first Major League home run. It came in the first inning of a game that Boston's pitching staff would eventually blow. Despite the loss, Yoshida was the big story. All offseason, skeptics opined that Yoshida's bat would not carry over into the Major Leagues, and in particular, his power. Yet his first home run was clobbered to the opposite field. Yoshida would go into a slump after that home run though and it would take a little bit of time before he would be able to get going again. Luckily, he did start hitting again.
I still think the biggest key to his success during that hot streak (and hopefully going forward) was him realizing he could just lift the ball right at the Green Monster and be an automatic doubles machine.
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