Right on the heels of our Central League Status Report for April, we present to you our first monthly review for the Pacific League.

Things are very tight in the Pacific League right now with Tohoku (Rakuten) leading the way, and Chiba (Lotte)’s starting pitching keeping them in sixth. That said, the difference between first and sixth on the day that this podcast was recorded was negligible, and the Pacific League seems to be shaping up to be as exciting as it usually is.

Things that surprised us: the Orix Butchers (the 2009 Pacific League Preview podcast might help shed some light on where that moniker came from) are picking up right where they left off last season, and Fukuoka is right in the thick of the playoff hunt. This should be an exciting league to watch in 2009!
For additional information and discussion related to the 2009 baseball season, check out Tsubamegun.

Many thanks to everyone who continues to listen!

Quick tip: keep the volume down low. We’re still finding our way around the ’studio’, and the result is that there’s some background noise involved at higher volume levels. We’ll get that sorted out soon, but in the meantime, please accept our apologies for the lack of production skills on our part.

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 April 2009 Pacific League Review: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

We’re already through with the first month of the baseball season, so here’s our review of how things currently stand in the Central League.

As of the time of this recording, things were largely shaping up as we had predicted in our Central League Preview podcast which was published last month. In other words, Yomiuri is at the top of the league, and Yokohama is at the bottom.

However, things are quite a bit tighter from first through sixth than we had anticipated. That means that there’s a significant amount of competition for the three Climax Series playoff spots at this point, and while it’s still early, all six clubs are currently in with a shot.

For additional information and discussion related to the 2009 baseball season, check out Tsubamegun.

Many thanks to everyone who continues to listen!

Quick tip: keep the volume down low. We’re still finding our way around the ’studio’, and the result is that there’s some background noise involved at higher volume levels. We’ll get that sorted out soon, but in the meantime, please accept our apologies for the lack of production skills on our part.

Listen Now:

 April 2009 Central League Review: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

As promised in our last podcast, we’re back with our season preview for NPB’s Central League.

In this edition of NPB Spotlight, Dave Watkins and I (well, mostly Dave, really) try to make some sense of all the player movement that occurred during the off-season. Dave recovers a bit from the hangover he was suffering while recording our last show and is in rare form for much of this edition. His preferred metaphor when waxing poetic about the Yomiuri Giants will be of particular interest to those who regularly follow TPR’s Spotlight on Nippon Pro Yakyu.

The plan for the 2009 campaign is for us to post an NPB podcast with updates every month or so. Please check back in at the end of April for our take on the ins and outs of Japanese Professional Baseball through the first month of the season.

For additional information and discussion related to the 2009 baseball season, check out Tsubamegun.

Many thanks to everyone who continues to listen!

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 Standard Podcast: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

With the WBC out of the way and Japan successfully defending its title, it would now seem that the time has come to turn our full attention to the 2009 NPB baseball season. We’re very excited to be able to get this out to you before the season begins this year!

In this edition of NPB Spotlight Dave Watkins and I run through the majority of the off-season player cuts and acquisitions that took place in the Pacific League. We also make a few predictions about which teams are on the way up, which ones are headed south, and also the ones that may just be treading water this season.

And please check back here again soon for the Central League season preview which will be posted in a few day’s time.

For additional information related to the 2009 baseball season, check out Tsubamegun.

As always, thank you very much for listening!

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 2009 Japanese Pro Baseball Season Preview: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

We know that you probably have lost all interest in last season, but we thought we’d punctuate that one before bringing you our annual Season Preview broadcast. So let’s all take a moment to reminisce a bit. It was another year of surprises from NPB with a strong finish from a team that we predicted to be a mid-table team before the season began.

In this edition of NPB Spotlight we are proud to introduce Dave Watkins who will be joining Christopher Pellegrini from now on.

For additional information related to the 2009 baseball season, check out Tsubamegun.

As always, thank you very much for listening.

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 2008 NPB Season Recap: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

We recently had a chance to sit down with Dan Gordon and speak with him about his newly released book, Haunted Baseball: Ghosts, Curses, Legends and Eerie Events, which he co-authored with Mickey Bradley.

The book covers some of the folk and ghostlore that players in North America have traded for generations as they make their way from city to city every summer.

(Read on …)

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 Dan Gordon Interview: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Black Stripe Theater will present Nobel Laureate Harold Pinter’s “The Homecoming “on July 4-5-6 at the Theatre Atelier Fontaine in Azabu Juban.

The Homecoming is the kind of play for which you would do well to prepare yourself, so be warned what you are getting yourself into: a lethal, haunting drama about familial one-upmanship, seduction, lust and betrayal.

Brilliant dialogue, dark humor and an air of menace have long marked it out as one of Pinter’s finest and most important works. (Read on …)

We’re a little disappointed that both hanami and baseball season have arrived at the same time this spring, but we’ve been doing our best to take in as much of both as humanly possible. To help you catch up on the latter while you may be busier doing the former, we offer you a quick-and-dirty preview of what might be expected from this year’s NPB season.

Team news for all 12 clubs in the Central and Pacific leagues is presented in the accompanying podcast. Changes, both good and bad, and some expectations for the coming months are discussed in this edition of TPR Spotlight on NPB.

League standings after games played April 4th, 2008: (Read on …)

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In this edition of TPR spotlight, Debito Arudou joins TPR’s Garrett DeOrio and Ken Worsley to discuss the upcoming release of his new book, Handbook for Newcomers, Migrants, and Immigrants, which is set to go on sale from March 15.

In the interview, Debito speaks about why the book was written, what kinds of resources it offers for people moving to Japan, his relationship with co-author Akira Higuchi, the upcoming book tour, and what might be in store for the future of Japan’s increasing number of foreign residents who decide to stay in Japan long term, if not permanently.

For more information on the book, and on Debito’s upcoming book tour, please see his blog at www.debito.org.

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 Spotlight #6 - Debito Arudou: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Baseball season is coming!

There was one hell of a free agent class this year with 17 players reaching free agency for the first time. A total of 68 players became free agents at the end of the 2007 baseball season, and there are some notable names in that group.

It appears that all 68 free agents have signed contracts as of March, 2008. Several guys will be trying their luck in the majors this year.

It was reported that six guys switched clubs in both 1994 and 2001. I don’t know if that was some kind of record, but far more than six guys moved around during the 2007-2008 off-season. And might I be so bold as to suggest that the trend will continue in the future.

Here are some of the names that have made the news this off-season:

Kazuhiro Wada (Seibu Lions) was looking around a bit before the Japan Series got under way. He became a free agent after 11 seasons with the Saitama-based team. The team had signaled its intent to keep him on and even mentioned a future coaching position as a symbol of its interest in the 35-year-old veteran’s services.

In 2005, Wada was the batting champion of the Pacific League. He had been a solid contributor to the Lion’s many winning campaigns since he arrived.

Unfortunately for the Lions, he eventually worked out a three-year deal with the Chunichi Dragons worth a reported 840 million yen. The veteran has put together a solid career so far, and it should be interesting to see if he is able to keep performing at the .300-plus level for the next few seasons. I don’t see any reason, barring injury, why he shouldn’t be able to do just that.

(Read on …)