Atsunori Inaba eloquently stated that he doesn't play baseball to come up with 2,000 hits. He plays the game to win for his team.
So instead of regretting coming up with just one hit on the night, the team-first veteran was pleased that one hit ended up being a significant one for his club.
Inaba, who entered the game two hits shy of 2,000 for his career, went 1-for-3 and launched a solo homer into the seats to lead the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters to a 2-1 victory over the Chiba Lotte Marines at Tokyo Dome on Thursday night.