October 27, 2011 - Nippon-Ham Won the Lottery for the Pick Yomiuri Had Announced
At the 47th draft on October 27, 2011, Yomiuri made Tokai University pitcher Tomoyuki Sugano its first-round bid. Sugano was one of the “college Big Three” along with Takahiro Fujioka of Toyo University and Yusuke Nomura of Meiji University. His grandfather, Mitsugu Hara, was the overall director of baseball at the Tokai-affiliated schools, and his uncle, Tatsunori Hara, was Yomiuri's manager at the time. Given these ties, Yomiuri had announced early that Sugano would be its first pick, and like Hirokazu Sawamura the year before, he was expected to go to Yomiuri unopposed. On draft day Nikkan Sports reported the club's confidence of “no competition,” and Sponichi ran the headline “a third straight solo catch.” On October 17, Sponichi had reported that if a club other than his preferred one picked him, playing in the United States was also an option, hinting that he would refuse anyone but Yomiuri.
Nippon-Ham, however, also bid on Sugano, and in the lottery the club president drew the winning ticket. An article by Kinya Nishimura in the Asahi Shimbun and an article by Junji Koseki in Number Web describe the hall erupting in cheers and applause. At the same draft, Fujioka and Shuhei Takahashi each drew three bids and went to Lotte and Chunichi, while Nomura was Hiroshima's unopposed pick.
Refusal and a Year in Limbo - “A Dream I Have Had Since I Was Little”
On November 21, 2011, Sugano announced that he would not sign with Nippon-Ham and chose to sit out a year. His statement read: “I was honored to hear so much from Nippon-Ham. But my dream since I was little was stronger than that.” From late January 2012 he spent about six weeks at a training facility in Arizona, and on March 31 Nippon-Ham announced that it had given up on signing him.
For that year, Sugano stayed at Tokai University by deferring his graduation. The rules barred him from outside games, so his pitching was limited to bullpen sessions, intrasquad games and live batting practice with the university team, and there were concerns about the long gap away from real competition. Sugano has said that watching high school and professional games was a plus.
October 25, 2012 - No Rival Bids and an Unopposed First Pick by Yomiuri
At the 48th draft on October 25, 2012, Yomiuri took Sugano in the first round. No other club bid on him. Nippon-Ham, which had won his rights a year earlier, announced (Mainichi Shimbun evening edition, October 24, 2012) that it would pick Shohei Ohtani of Hanamaki Higashi High School, who had expressed his wish to play in the United States, and it signed him after an unopposed first-round pick.
After the draft, manager Tatsunori Hara visited Tokai University, and Sugano put on a Yomiuri uniform bearing number 19 and his name. The terms of his provisional contract on November 21 were reported as a 100 million yen signing bonus plus 50 million yen in incentives and a 15 million yen salary (all estimates).
The Lineage - Players Who Refused Other Clubs and Ended Up at Yomiuri
Sugano's year was no exception. Listing the players who refused picks by other clubs before joining Yomiuri, together with the player Chunichi passed on so that only Yomiuri picked him, gives the following line from Suguru Egawa to Sugano. The full history of draft refusals is covered in the article on draft refusal incidents.
| Player | Pick refused | Time waited | Joined Yomiuri |
|---|---|---|---|
| Suguru Egawa | 1973 Hankyu, 1st round 1977 Crown Lighter, 1st round | Went to Hosei University One year out after 1977 | 1978 “Blank Day” contract → Hanshin 1st-round pick → trade for Shigeru Kobayashi |
| Daisuke Motoki (Uenomiya High) | 1989 Daiei, 1st round | 1 year (baseball study in Hawaii) | 1990, 1st round (sole bid) |
| Tetsuya Utsumi (Tsuruga Kehi High) | 2000 Orix, 1st round | 3 years (Tokyo Gas) | 2003, free-acquisition slot |
| Hisayoshi Chono (Nihon University) | 2006 Nippon-Ham, 4th round 2008 Lotte, 2nd round | 3 years (Honda) | 2009, 1st round (sole bid) |
| Hirokazu Sawamura (Chuo University) | None (Chunichi passed on a 1st-round pick) | None | 2010, 1st round (sole bid) |
| Tomoyuki Sugano (Tokai University) | 2011 Nippon-Ham, 1st round (lottery) | 1 year (deferred graduation) | 2012, 1st round (sole bid) |
Egawa's path from the “Blank Day” to the Kobayashi trade is covered in the article on the Egawa incident and the article on Shigeru Kobayashi. Motoki wanted to join Yomiuri, but in 1989 Yomiuri's first pick was Tsuyoshi Omori of Keio University, who had reportedly been promised the pick in his third year of college. After refusing Daiei's first-round pick, made after the club lost the lottery for Hideo Nomo, Motoki could not be drafted for four years if he went to college or three if he joined a corporate team, so he sat out and went to Hawaii for a year of baseball study. On November 24, 1990, he was picked by Yomiuri, and owner Toru Shoriki had announced the promise of a first-round pick the day before.
Utsumi, whose grandfather had played for Yomiuri as a position player, is said to have declared just before the draft that he would refuse any club but Yomiuri. When Orix took him in the first round in 2000, a call from manager Akira Ogi briefly swayed him, but he refused after his high school batterymate was picked by Yomiuri in the eighth round, and he went on to Tokyo Gas. Chono turned down Nippon-Ham's fourth-round pick in 2006, and his Nihon University manager said Nippon-Ham was “the club Chono dislikes most” (Sponichi, November 22, 2006). In 2008 he was reported as intending to stay with his company rather than turn pro if a club other than Yomiuri picked him (Sponichi, September 9, 2008). Yomiuri then moved away from its promise of a first-round pick, taking Taishi Ota first and planning Chono for the second round, and Lotte, which picked earlier, took Chono in the second round. Chono announced his refusal on December 3, and Yomiuri's scouts visited his family home to apologize.
Chono joined Yomiuri as its unopposed first pick in 2009, the first player since Hikaru Okamoto in 1982 to refuse twice and sign on the third pick. Sawamura refused no one in 2010, but he wanted Yomiuri and was described as a “mutual love match” (Sanspo, October 29, 2010), and Chunichi, which had been expected to make him its first pick, passed on draft day for fear that he would refuse to sign, according to Nikkan Gendai (October 15, 2011). Sawamura himself said he might have chosen to turn pro in the United States had a club other than Yomiuri picked him.
Who Paid the Price - Wasted Picks and Empty Years
For five of the six players in the table, all but Sawamura, there was a club that used a pick without getting the player: Hankyu in 1973, Crown Lighter in 1977, Daiei in 1989 (1st round), Orix in 2000 (1st round), Nippon-Ham in 2006 (4th round) and 2011 (1st round), and Lotte in 2008 (2nd round).
The players paid as well, with one to three years each, as the table shows. Yomiuri, meanwhile, got its players after waiting. By the reported estimates, Chono and Sugano each received a 100 million yen signing bonus plus 50 million yen in incentives, the cap for rookie contracts at the time (Motoki's bonus was 90 million yen).
Yomiuri's advance promises were also reported again and again. For Motoki, owner Toru Shoriki announced a first-round promise the day before the draft; for Chono, the club promised a first-round pick, moved him to the second round, apologized, and on February 5, 2009 announced its plan to take him first; for Sugano, it announced early that he would be its first pick. Omori was reportedly promised a first-round pick in his third year of college, and that promise was the reason Motoki was passed over. The club signals a promise before the draft, and the player relies on it to refuse other clubs. In a draft meant to allocate players by lottery and pick order, Yomiuri followed this sequence time after time.
From 2007 the reverse nomination, free-acquisition and preferred-entry slots were abolished, and college and corporate players also lost the ability to choose their club (see the article on the reverse nomination system). The only way left for a player to choose a club was to refuse a pick and wait, and Chono and Sugano joined Yomiuri that way. The cost of waiting falls on the player who spends empty years and on the club whose pick is wasted, while Yomiuri, the club that makes them wait, rewarded Chono and Sugano for waiting with announced first-round picks and capped signing bonuses.
How to Read This Article and Its Limits - What Could and Could Not Be Confirmed
No statement in which Sugano himself declared a preference for Yomiuri could be confirmed. What could be confirmed is that Yomiuri announced its first-round plan early, and that sports papers treated an unopposed pick as certain and reported a hint that he would refuse other clubs. The only reason Sugano gave for his refusal was “my dream since I was little,” and no statement by Sugano citing his uncle's position as a reason could be confirmed.
Statements by Nippon-Ham executives or managers are not included because no verifiable record was found. For the same reason the article does not explain why other clubs avoided Sugano in 2012; all that is known is that the pick was unopposed. Utsumi's declaration that he would refuse other clubs is a statement with no cited source, and all contract and salary figures are reported estimates.