Brandon Laird rounded third base wearing a big smile on Saturday afternoon at Jingu Stadium. As he headed for home, Laird held out his left hand and tapped his palm with the index and middle fingers of his right, pantomiming someone making sushi, as he does after all of his home runs.

As usual, Fighters fans ate it up, and Hokkaido's most famous sushi chef, who served up a grand slam in a spring game against the Tokyo Yakult Swallows on Saturday (off Yakult's announced opening day starter David Buchanan), believes there's more where that came from.

"The fans enjoy it," Laird told The Japan Times, referring to his home run performance, in the visitors dugout. "It's a lot of fun. I enjoy doing it too, so I'm gonna keep it for as long as I'm in Japan."