Tomoyuki Kanno, the ace pitcher of the Japanese Giants who joined the Baltimore Orioles this year, recently accepted an interview with the BS East TV program "Tomoyuki Kanno's Challenge Has a Story", and once again mentioned his benefactor Wang Jianmin, who was at a turning point in his life.

Tomoyuki Kanno is 35 years old. At the end of last year, he challenged Major League Baseball in the form of overseas FA and signed a one-year, $13 million contract with the Baltimore Golden Orioles. This year, he performed extremely well in the spring training warm-up match of the Golden Orioles.

In Japan's BS East TV program "Tomoyuki Kanno's Challenge Has a Story", the experience of the older newcomer Tomoyuki Kanno's challenge to the major leagues is introduced with 5 turning points, of which the fourth turning point is "the encounter that changes the future", telling the story of Wang Jianmin and Hiroki Kuroda, two important figures who supported his pitching career, "Because of two Asian legends, I have who I am today."

Tomoyuki Kanno was named with the first pick by the Japan Ham team in the 2011 draft, but he refused to join the team and insisted on joining the Yomiuri Giants, and since then he has been a wanderer. It was during that time that he met his first legendary football player, Wang Jianmin, at his training base in Arizona.

Wang Jianmin played for the Yankees, won 19 consecutive years and became the first Asian pitcher to win the major league. The two were introduced to each other by a local trainer, and Wang Jianmin taught Kanno how to throw a stretch ball.

When the Yomiuri Giants traveled to Taipei in March last year, the two reunited after a 12-year absence. Kanno personally expressed his gratitude to Wang Jianmin: "That experience at that time made me who I am today." Wang Jianmin said modestly: "The statement of benefactors is too exaggerated, I just think that as Asians, it would be good to support each other."

"Just a coincidence." Wang Jianmin talked about his encounter with Tomoyuki Kanno last year, he said: "He is also quite quiet like me, we didn't talk about a lot, we didn't talk about anything, he mainly wanted to be a giant, there was no way to go to a giant, he chose not to play professional baseball first, I just told him that his own ideas can make him more fulfilling during this time to create himself, and better things come out."

Wang Jianmin also recommended to Kanno a "worthy of learning", this person is Hiroki Kuroda, who has played for the Hiroshima team and has also had brilliant achievements in Yankees and other teams.

Kanno recalled, "If I had known all of this, I would have said to myself, 'What I do now will be recognized.'" When I heard that Mr. Kuroda's two-seam speedball was very good, I started to pay close attention to him and was completely attracted to him."

"During the 2015 All-Star Game, I was in the training room at Tokyo Dome, and I had the opportunity to spend time alone with Mr. Kuroda. It is said that he had heard that I admired him very much, so he signed his book and left the word 'come on' for me. I received this gift through someone else's handover, so I had to thank him personally when we met. I told him, 'I've always used that as a motivation to motivate myself and work hard.' We also talked about a lot of profound topics, and that conversation was very memorable."