Articles tagged with draft

Who Built Hanshin's 2020 "Divine Draft" - The Scouts Behind Each Pick and the Manager Who Pushed for the Late Rounds

A look at the nine players Hanshin selected at the October 26, 2020 draft, through their scouts and the words of manager Akihiro Yano. Under chief scout Shunji Hatayama, area scouts covered their own players, and the manager pushed for the fifth, sixth and eighth rounds. Counting titles together with MVP and Rookie of the Year awards, Shoki Murakami and Takumu Nakano won eight between them from 2021 to 2025.

Teams Estimated reading time: 6 min

3.6 Billion Yen for Six Rookies - How Yomiuri's Signing Bonuses Blew Past NPB's Agreed Standard, and the Ruling That Stood

On March 15, 2012, the Asahi Shimbun reported that Yomiuri had signed six rookies who joined between fiscal 1997 and 2004 for a combined ¥3.6 billion, ¥2.7 billion over the ¥150 million per player the 12 clubs had agreed on. Yomiuri sued for defamation, but the courts found the excess to be true. Yomiuri won only ¥3.3 million over certain passages, and the ruling became final in 2016.

Controversies Estimated reading time: 7 min

Only Yomiuri Would Do - Tomoyuki Sugano's Year in Limbo and the Lineage of Draft Refusals That Ended in a Yomiuri Uniform

At the 2011 draft, Nippon-Ham won the lottery for Tomoyuki Sugano, whom Yomiuri had announced as its first pick. Sugano refused, sat out a year and joined Yomiuri as its unopposed first pick in 2012. This article traces the “Yomiuri or nothing” lineage from Suguru Egawa through Daisuke Motoki, Tetsuya Utsumi, Hisayoshi Chono and Hirokazu Sawamura, from the side of the clubs whose picks were wasted.

Controversies Estimated reading time: 6 min

The 1981 Draft: Yomiuri Picked Tadaaki Yoshimura After He Chose College - The Same Playbook Four Years Before Kuwata

At the 1981 draft Yomiuri took PL Gakuen captain Tadaaki Yoshimura in the third round although he had announced he would attend Hosei University, and after direct talks he signed. Using the scout's own testimony and contemporary reports, this article traces why Yomiuri made the pick, how the talks went, why it was the same pattern as Masumi Kuwata four years later, and how the 2004 pro declaration form shut that pattern down.

Controversies Estimated reading time: 6 min