While there has been talk for years that one of three PL teams, the Fighters, Orix BlueWave and Seibu Lions would head take up residence in Sapporo, the Lions had appeared to have the lead in the race.
Before building Sapporo Dome, it seems the city had asked the pro baseball establishment to schedule 20 games a year there, and the Lions had volunteered to carry the bulk of that load. After all, they are having trouble attracting weeknight crowds to Seibu Dome in Saitama Prefecture, so why not go somewhere with a larger population than Tokorozawa.
But while the Lions were eager to lock other teams out of the running for a permanent Hokkaido home under the dome, they were dragging their feet about a big commitment to the great white north.
The Pacific League, having witnessed the dramatic turn around of the Hawks franchise was eager for an encore. After purchasing the Hawks from the Osaka-based Nankai Railroad, Daiei transplanted their new team in Fukuoka, which had been without a team for 10 years, since the Lions were uprooted by Seibu in 1979 and hauled off to Tokorozawa.
The Hawks have gone from one of the least supported teams in Japan to one of the best by steadily building a massive fan base in northern Kyushu. The PL has been looking at Sapporo for years and now that Nippon Ham has announced its intention to battle for that open territory, expect some fur to fly.
"Things are very difficult right now," PL Secretary General Shigeru Murata said on Monday. "Until now, Hokkaido has been open territory for all 12 teams. The staff at Sapporo Dome has said that they cannot host more than 70 baseball games a year there due to soccer and other commitments.
"If the Fighters move to Sapporo, it effectively means no one else can play (home games) there and no one is happy about that possibility."
Everything is going to hinge on the kind of effort the Fighters intend to make up north. The worst case scenario would see the team move to Sapporo and do little in the way of aggressively courting the fans. That would be worse than making no move at all.
On the other hand, if the Fighters went up there with a long-term plan to encourage the locals to adopt the Fighters as their home town, there is no reason the team could not duplicate the results the Hawks have achieved in Fukuoka.
It has been said that the people of Hokkaido are largely Giants fans. To some extent, there will always be Giants fans everywhere because of their tradition of success and media saturation.
But having a local team that you can adopt and which responds to the fans and goes out of its way to make its games a positive experience can change the landscape.
"We are all interested in seeing their business plan" said Murata. "Because if they are going to go all out, then nobody will be opposed."
Although best known for their almost complete lack of a fan base, the Fighters organization has become quite energetic in recent years. They built a first-class minor league facility in Kamagaya, Chiba Prefecture. Last year the team began selling its Fs Passes, which allow the owner upper deck admission to all of the team's games at Tokyo Dome for just ¥19,000 a year.
Because of their efforts, the Fighters' attendance slipped just slightly last season despite going from pennant contender in 2000 to doormat by May 2001.
Japanese baseball needs to take bold steps. If the Fighters are going
to be in the forefront, more power to them.
!!!
In response to recent columns about the properties of Mizuno's flying baseballs, at least two players have pointed out that the resiliency of the ball is only one factor why more home runs are hit in some games than others.
The data reported in this column only controlled for ball parks and home teams during the 2001 season. There were 2.07 home runs per game in the 41 Hawks games at Fukuoka Dome last year using Mizuno balls, while there were 1.63 home runs per game at the same venue in 24 games using balls made by Kubota and Zett.
At Chiba Marine Stadium, there were 1.97 homers hit per Marines game using Mizuno balls, while there were 1.45 per game when the Marines used Asics balls.
All other things being equal, one would expect balls with similar properties to show less of a difference. The temperature, the wind, the actual pitchers, the composition of the teams on that day, the game situation, and the size of the balls are all factors in how often home runs are hit.
If Mizuno's balls do go further, one would expect to see home runs more often. The data supports such a conclusion. Because of numerous other factors that cannot be controlled for, one can not know how big a factor these balls are. But they probably are a factor.
Despite their reported flight characteristics, one pitcher, at least, says he likes them.
"The Mizuno balls have higher seems," said Dragons starter Mel Bunch. "So that helps my breaking pitches. They've got some bigger than others. If I get those small ones, my curveballs are going to be great."
The Hot Corner appears each Thursday in The
Daily Yomiuri .