Kenta Maeda Hits Monster HR in Japanese Game Show

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PHOTO: CARLOS GONZALEZ – STAR TRIBUNE

In his home country of Japan, Kenta Maeda is much more than the ace pitcher for the Minnesota Twins or even a runner-up Cy Young candidate. He’s a cult hero and a social media icon. Just take a look at his subscriber/view counts on YouTube.

Maeda has to make a healthy chunk of money on YouTube. For context, Trevor Bauer is BY FAR the biggest American MLB personality on social media. His YouTube subscriber count is 137K. Kenta has 317K on his channel… so triple what Bauer has.

Trevor Bauer hopes to get 75K views on his individual videos. Kenta Maeda doesn’t even get the camera out for less than 250K. I mean… Bauer doesn’t even get in the YouTube ring with Maeda.

Still unsigned, Trevor would be smart to take a one or two-year MLB paycut to come to Minnesota. He can dominate his former Cleveland Baseball Team and have Maeda help him build his YouTube following. It’s a long-play investment.

Reality superstars will reality superstar

When you’re a reality (YouTube) TV star like Kenta Maeda, then your talent is bound to show, no matter the activity. Whether he’s doing personal videos, dominating MLB hitters or hitting massive dingers in Japanese game shows.

That’s right. Kenta Maeda can hit too. I have no idea what is happening in this “game show” but I can clearly see the Minnesota Twins ace jump all over this practice fastball and rocket launch it into the left field seats, where the bleachers would sit underneath the “Budweiser” sign at Target Field.

Dingers are dingers no matter what format you hit them in.

The Legend of Kenta Maeda grows

I don’t know how many times Maeda took a swing during this “game show” or how many times he may have made a fool of himself (he probably didn’t), because this is the climax of television.

TV doesn’t get any better than a superstar personality/pitcher hitting a major league home run during a clearly tense moment with the announcer going absolutely ballistic in the background..

And it only adds to Kenta Maeda’s legend both here and abroad. And how about doing it while wearing his white Minnesota Twins uniform?

Eric Strack | Minnesota Sports Fan

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