Posts Tagged: baseball

All Posts / News — No Comments
2
Jun 10

America’s 2nd Female Professional Baseball Player Is Japanese!

As we previously discussed, America’s pastime, baseball, has quite a following in Japan. It’s fitting, then, that the second woman to play baseball professionally in America is a Japanese import: 18-year-old Yoshida Eri.

Yoshida, nicknamed “Nakkuru Hime” “(“Knuckle Princess”), actually already knows what it’s like to whiz past gender boundaries, as she became Japan’s first female professional baseball player in 2008 at the age of 16, when still in high school! (Her actual debut was in March 2009 at the age of 17.) She was drafted into the Kobe 9 Cruise, one of four teams in the Kansai Independent Baseball League (comparable to Minor League Baseball here). Yoshida, a pitcher, helped lead her team to victory in the first game with her sidearm knuckleball. She played in eleven games with the Kobe 9 Cruise before coming to the US joining the Arizona Winter League, a short-season independent professional league, in late 2009.

While playing in the Arizona Winter League, Yoshida caught the attention of the Chico Outlaws (Chico, California) and was offered a contract to play on the team in the Golden Baseball League, an independent ten-team baseball league. She’s spent the past spring training and just recently debuted in her first official game with the team.

Yoshida’s training experience was made more special for her because Boston Red Sox knuckleball pitcher Tim Wakefield came to help her train at the Boston Red Sox’s minor league training center. Yoshida credits Wakefield for her style, as videos she saw of his pitching are what inspired her to adapt her trademark “knuckle princess” pitching style.

Yoshida is currently the only female professional baseball player in the U.S. and is only the second female professional U.S. baseball player in history. She’s also now the first female baseball player to play professional in more than one country.

Her first game with the Chico Outlaws took place on May 29th and she helped lead to the team to victory when she pitched for three innings.

Because of the increased interest in Yoshida’s debut, the Chico Outlaws are streaming their games online. If you want to watch Yoshida in action, check out the Outlaws’ website.

Have you ever heard of Yoshida Eri? Have you seen her play? Do you think it’s fitting that a Japanese woman is making baseball history in the U.S.? Why or why not?

All Posts / Culture / Entertainment — No Comments
26
Apr 10

“America’s Pastime” in Japan: Japanese Baseball

Baseball may be America’s pastime, but it seems like other sports such as football often take the spotlight away from the sport. In Japan, though, baseball has been the most popular league sport in the country for decades (although soccer may be starting to steal some of the spotlight).

Contrary to popular belief, baseball was not introduced to Japan by American soldiers after World War II and has been present in Japan since 1872. The first game took place at Kaisei Gakko (which is now Tokyo University), where an American professor organized a game and introduced the game to the nation. Professional nation-wide teams have been present in Japan since 1934 and the national league was established in 1936. Rules fluctuated but have remained mostly the same since 1950, when two leagues became the norm.

The two leagues in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPL; “Nippon” is one word for Japan) are the Pacific and the Central Leagues and there are six teams in each league. In the Central League, there are the Chunichi Dragons from Nagoya, the Hanshin Tigers from Nishinomiya, the Yokohama BayStars from Yokohama, the Hiroshima Toyo Carp from Hiroshima, the Tokyo Yakult Swallows from Tokyo, and the Yomiuri Giants from Tokyo.

In the Pacific League, the teams are the Orix Buffaloes from Osaka, the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks from Fukuoka, the Chiba Lotte Marines from Chiba, the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters from Sapporo, the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles from Sendai, and the Saitama Seibu Lions from Tokorozawa.

The baseball season lasts from April through October with a total of 144 games. The two leagues have their own championships and then the winning teams from each league compete in the Japan Championship Series, a seven-game championship that airs in October and November. The Japan Championship Series doesn’t affect the participating teams’ rankings, so it’s similar the World Series in America, but it’s a beloved annual event in the world of Japanese sports.

Almost as popular as professional baseball is the annual high school tournament called the Koushien. The Japanese High School Baseball Federation allows Japanese high school teams nationwide to compete in two tournaments (one in the spring and one in the summer) that culminate in a final 2-week tournament of 49 teams at the Hanshin Koushien Tournament in August. Many high school players who hope to go pro know that their performance at this tournament can make or break their dreams.

Have you ever watched a Japanese baseball game? Have you ever seen how supportive the Japanese fans are for their teams? Why do you think baseball is more popular in Japan than it is in the US?