It's been a week of benchmarks in NPB, with a few players reaching nice, round numbers.
The biggest milestone achieved was by Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks closer Dennis Sarfate, who closed out a win over the Orix Buffaloes at Yafuoku Dome on Wednesday night for his 200th career save (and NPB-best 25th this season) in Japan. Sarfate is only the sixth player to reach that number in Japanese baseball and the first foreign player to hit the mark.
"A lot of games," Sarfate said during his hero interview on Wednesday. "Especially with this team, we win so much, so I just knew that getting 200 saves is . . . we won 200 games when I pitched. For me, that's more special."