Fighters!

Congratulations! Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters has won the 2016 Pacific League Championship for the first time in 4 years. It's the first title for Ace Otani who was the winning pitcher in the game. 

I hope Fighters and Carp will succeed the Climax   Series. I want to watch Fighrers and Carp in Nippon Series games this year. 

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Hiroshima Becomes Champion

Japanese professional baseball team Hiroshima Carp has won the 2016 Central League championship for the first time in 25 years. The last victory was in 1991, so the fans were waiting for the triumph long lond years. 

When I was a middle and high school student, Carp was reall strong. But after free agent system was introduced, Carp lost many good players by the system. 

The winning game took place at Tokyo Dome against Tokyo Giamts. Even so, the stand was filled with Carp red uniforms as at Mazda Studiam in Hiroshima. 

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A Rotten Rule of Koshien

A female high school baseball member helped team practice in Koshien field, but she was forced to go out from the ground by a official. That was becaus she was a woman. That's ridiculous. 

She has been supported the team for a long time and that was common scene for her teammates. Why she had to be out of Koshien field? That was a nonsensical rule. It should be changed immediately. 

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Izumo Goes to Koshien

I went to watch the final of Shimane high school baseball taurnament today. Izumo high school won over Risshodai Shonan and advanced to Koshien for the first time in their history. Izumo is a public school and it was the first time in 12 years for public schools to go to summer Koshien. 

Almost every audiences there seemed to cheer Izumo high school. That was a great advantage for the team. I was sorry for Risshodai Shonan high school then. 

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PL Gakuen

Japan's high school baseball giant PL Gakuen team has vanished. Only 12 seniors were in their last game this summer. They didn't have sophomores and juniors because PL had stooped recruiting new players any longer. 

The glorious baseball team won seven Koshien titles and has provided many professional baseball players. 

What happened to PL Gakuen? One of the reasons might be violences in the team. Sometimes, violence cases bitween students were reported. Graduates often said that they had a very strict rule that juniors had to obey seniors with no reasons. If so, the vanishment would be a deserved result. 

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Senbatsu Koshien

As the Senbatsu High School Basketball Tournament starts soon, I found my son's friend on the newspaper. The newspaper introduced the local high school baseball team and he was on the list. He will take part in Senbatsu as a player. I rarely watch high school baseball, but I'll watch his game if I have a chance. 

Speaking of high school baseball, I don't really like it because they don't have limited pitch for pitchers. Many good pitchers might be destroyed their arms and shoulders by too much pitching at Koshien. I hope they will limit the number of pitch in the games. 

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Gambling on Baseball Again

Japan's popular professional baseball team Yomiuri Giants announced another player, Takagi Kyosuke, was involved in gambling on NPB baseball games, while three players had expelled from the team for gambling last year. 

The president of Giants said that he was sorry for they could not find Takagi's illegal gambling through interview last year. But that's not the point. Gambling itself is the problem, especially on their field. 

Think of it. If a jockey bet on his own race? How about a sumo wrestler? If they bet on their profession, what do you think of it? That definitely shouldn't do.

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Kiyohara and Drugs

A former top professional baseball star Kiyohara Kazuhiro has arrested for possessing illegal drugs at his apartment. The news was spread out late at night yesterday. I wasn't surprised at the news because there was a rumor that Kiyohara had been hospitalized due to drug use. A weekly magazine reported that several years ago. 

Even though he had had that suspicion of drug use since the magazine was published, many Japanese people might be shocked by the arrest. Kiyohara was definitely a baseball super star in Japan. He grabbed many Championship Flags of NPB, got some MVP titles and made hundreds of home runs. This was a real betrayal for baseball fans. 

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Nippon Series

NPB Nippon Series has been held at Fukuoka Dome. Today is the second of the series and The SoftBank Hawks won over Tokyo Yakult Swallows two games in a row. 

Swallows have great hitters, but they could not perform well in this series. They might be examined by Hawks intelligence team. On the other hand, Hawks looked aggressive for getting scores and did it well. 

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Baseball Amateur Draft

Nippon Professional Baseball held 2015 amateur draft today. Over a hundred players will enter the professional  baseball world. 

I hope everyone will perform well in the world and make fans excited. 

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Swallows Advance to Nippon Series

Tokyo Yakult Swallows beat Giants at Climax Series. I'm glad to hear the news, but I'm not a fan of Swallows. I'm just a super anti Giants. I wanted Carp to go to the final, so I'm a little bit sad. 

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Betting Scandal

According to the Yomiuri Giants, Satoshi Fukuda and Shoki Kasahara have bet on the summer high school baseball tournament and professional baseball games, including Giants' games. Fukuda is believed to have lost a total of more than one million yen through the gamble. 

Gambling on baseball games privately is illegal. The police and NPB, Nippon Professional Baseball, will punish them if it is true. 

Betting on baseball games scandal happened among sumo wrestlers some years ago, and they held a tournament without spectators as a punishment. 

NPB and Yomiuri have to do a through investigation.  

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Swallows

Haruki Murakami might be very happy now because he is a big fan of Tokyo Yakult Swallows. Swallows have just won  Japan's Professional Baseball Central League Championship tonight. Congratulations, Yakult and their fans! 

I don't know Swallows' manager and most of players, but I'm sure Furuta is no longer in the team. 

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No-Hitter Iwakuma

Hisashi Iwakuma became the second Japanese no-hitter in the Major League Baseball. The Seattle Mariners right-hander made a record over the Baltimore Orioles on Wednesday. The legend Hideo Nomo was the first Japanese no-hitter. 

I'm really glad to hear the news. He has been struggling to play since his old team was about to withdraw from Japanese professional baseball league. He said that he became nervous in the ninth inning and thought if this will makeTohoku fans happy. 

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Koshien

Japan high school basketball tournament begins at Koshien tomorrow. The tournament started 100 years ago and it became a popular summer event in Japan. 

I think the baseball tournament is deadly for players, especially for pitches. They have to play in this fatal conditions. Many remarkable pitchers have been destroyed because they had to pitch too much. The number of pitch should be limited like American baseball association do. 

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Ichiro Reaches Babe Ruth

A Japanese major league baseball player Ichiro has made 2,873th hits in major league career and tied Babe Ruth all-time hits. 

I'm not so familiar with Babe Ruth, but I know his play made baseball as a national sports in the United States. He made a huge number of home runs and gave a lot of joy for baseball fans. 

Ichiro is a different type of player. He has been made lots of hits. Could he reache the top with 4,256 hits as Pete Rose?

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Kuroda Wins the First Game

Former Yankees pitcher Hiroki Kuroda won his first game in eight years in Japan  with Hiroshima Carp. He has just returned from the major league to his home team, Carp. 

New York Yankees offered a huge contract, but he had chosen go back to Hiroshima with lower price, because he had promised to do so when he moved to the U.S. 

He might be nervous in the first game, but his fans gave him a special power to win the game against Swallows yesterday. He would appear on the ground every Sunday, I guess. I believe his pitching will lead Carp to get the Championship Flag of this season. 

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Kuroda Returns to Japan

A Japanese Major League Baseball player Hiroki Kuroda of Yankees will come back to Hiroshima Crap next season. He had played for Carp until eight years ago and then moved to America. 

He'll sign with Hiroshima less money than major league teams. He really likes his old team. 

I really look forward to seeing his pitching and I hope Hiroshima Carp will get the Japanese series champion flag next year.

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Shohei Otani

I watched a TV show yesterday. On the program, the next Softbank Hawks manager Kimiyasu Kudo interviewed with major league players Yu Darvish of Rangers and Masahiro Tanaka of Yankees. 

They talked about a Japanese baseball player Shohei Otani of Fighters. All of them said that Otani should focus on pitching because his pitch is really nice. Darvish and Tanaka also said that if he learns the way use his body more effectively, he can perform well in the major league. 

I agree with them. He is good at batting, but do not surpass others. If he decides to concentrate on pitching, he would attract Major League Baseball fans. 

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Congratulations, Hawks!

Fukuoka Hawks won the baseball Nippon Series against Tigers. Congratulations, the players, fans and of course head coach Mr. Akiyama!

Speaking of the Hawks, I sometimes went to see baseball games of the Hawks when I was a college student. I didn't go to Fukuoka Dome, but Osaka stadium. Yes, I watched Nankai Hawks' games at Osaka stadium. 

I was not a fan of Nankai Hawks at that time. I just wanted to kill the time. When the bottom of the fifth inning finished, we could watch the rest of the game for free. So, I never bought any tickets for the games. 

There were hundreds of people, literally some hundreds, including kissing couples watching the games. I could hear drunk fans shouting some indecent words. It was a nice memorie for me.