私のパンチは彼をロープに追い込んだ。
Watashi no panchi wa kare o rōpu ni oikonda.
My punch sent him reeling into the rope.
私 (watashi: I)
彼 (kare: he)
追い込む (oikomu: to drive into) to pursue + to drive inward
僕は追い込まれると一番仕事をする。
Boku wa oikomareru to ichiban shigoto o suru.
I work best under pressure.
僕 (boku: I (for men))
追い込む (oikomu: to make an extra effort at the end)
to pursue + to drive inward
一番 (ichiban: best) one + number in a series
仕事をする (shigoto o suru: to work) to serve + businessIn the sentence above, 追い込む appears in the passive form 追い込まれる (oikomareru). This “victimization” passive indicates that the speaker has been forced to work hard. And to extend the grammatical analysis a little further, the と after the verb means “when” or “if.” So the literal translation is “When (If) I’m made to work extremely hard, I do my best work.”
