The 2013 Japan Series (known as the ''

Konami , is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company, video game and entertainment company headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, Chūō, Tokyo, it also produces and distributes trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, pachinko machin ...

Nippon Series 2013'' for sponsorship reasons) was the 64th edition of

Nippon Professional Baseball or NPB is the highest level of baseball in Japan. Locally, it is often called , meaning ''Professional Baseball''. Outside Japan, it is often just referred to as "Japanese baseball". The roots of the league can be traced back to the formation ...

's (NPB) championship series known colloquially as the

Japan Series The Japan Series ( , officially the Japan Championship Series, ), also the Nippon Series, :File:2014_JS_logo.png is the annual championship series in Nippon Professional Baseball, the top baseball league in Japan. It is a best-of-seven series ...

. The

best-of-seven playoff There are a number of formats used in various levels of competition in sports and games to determine an overall champion. Some of the most common are the ''single elimination'', the ''best-of-'' series, the ''total points series'' more commonly kn ...

was won by the

Pacific League The or is one of the two professional baseball leagues constituting Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan. The winner of the league championship competes against the winner in the Central League for the annual Japan Series. It currently consis ...

champion

Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles The , often shortened as the , are a baseball team based in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. It has played in Nippon Professional Baseball's Pacific League since the team's formation in November 2004. The team is owned by the Internet shopping c ...

in seven games over the

Central League The or is one of the two professional baseball leagues that constitute Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan. The winner of the league championship plays against the winner of the Pacific League in the annual Japan Series. It currently consist ...

champion

Yomiuri Giants The are a Japanese professional baseball team competing in Nippon Professional Baseball's Central League. Based in Bunkyo, Tokyo, they are one of two professional baseball teams based in Tokyo, the other being the Tokyo Yakult Swallows. They ...

. It was the Eagles' first Japan Series appearance and their first win since the team's creation in 2005. The series began on Saturday, October 26, 2013 and ended on Sunday, November 3, 2013 at the

Miyagi Baseball Stadium , officially Miyagi Baseball Stadium, is a baseball stadium located in Miyaginohara Sports Park in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. The 30,508-seat ballpark is owned by the prefecture and operated by Rakuten, which has used it as the home field f ...

Sendai is the capital Cities of Japan, city of Miyagi Prefecture, the largest city in the Tōhoku region. , the city had a population of 1,091,407 in 525,828 households, and is one of Japan's 20 Cities designated by government ordinance of Japan, desig ...

Miyagi Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. Miyagi Prefecture has a population of 2,305,596 (1 June 2019) and has a geographic area of . Miyagi Prefecture borders Iwate Prefecture to the north, Akita Prefecture to the nort ...

. Eagles' starting pitcher

Manabu Mima Manabu Mima (, born September 19, 1986) is a Japanese professional baseball pitcher for the Chiba Lotte Marines of the Nippon Professional Baseball(NPB). He played for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles. Career Mima attended Fujishiro High Scho ...

, who was the winning pitcher in Games 3 and 7, was named the

Japan Series Most Valuable Player The is given to the player deemed to have the most impact on his team's performance in the Japan Series, which is the final round of the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) postseason. The award was first presented in 1950. The series follows a b ...

(MVP). This was also the last Japan Series that

would sponsor, as SMBC would take over the naming rights in 2014.

Climax Series

Summary

Game summaries

Game 1

' starter

Tetsuya Utsumi is a Japanese professional baseball player for the Saitama Seibu Lions of Nippon Professional Baseball(NPB). He previously played for the Yomiuri Giants. Career In , Orix BlueWave selected him with the first selection, but he did not sign, and ...

and relievers

Scott Mathieson Scott William Mathieson (born February 27, 1984) is a Canadian former professional baseball pitcher. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Philadelphia Phillies and in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) for the Yomiuri Giants. Career ...

Tetsuya Yamaguchi is a former Japanese Nippon Professional Baseball player with the Yomiuri Giants in Japan's Central League. Career He was playing in the Missoula Osprey (Advanced Rookie level under Arizona Diamondbacks) before he was drafted by the Giants in 2 ...

and

Kentaro Nishimura is a former Japanese Nippon Professional Baseball player. He played with the Yomiuri Giants in Japan's Central League The or is one of the two professional baseball leagues that constitute Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan. The winn ...

combined on a nine-hit shutout to beat the

and take one-game lead in the Series. Even though they failed to score in the game, the Eagles had several scoring opportunities. Their leadoff man reached base in six innings and they also ended six innings with at least one runner in scoring position. Eagles' rookie-starter Takahiro Norimoto performed well, holding the Giants to only four hits through eight and a third innings. The Giants' two runs came from a Hisayoshi Chono RBI-single in the fifth inning and

Shuichi Murata is a third baseman for the Tochigi Golden Braves of Baseball Challenge League. Murata led the Central League in home runs in both and and is one of the few pure home run hitters in Japanese professional baseball today. He played in the 200 ...

's solo homerun in the top of the eighth. In the bottom half of the inning, Giants' outfielder

Yoshiyuki Kamei was a Japanese politician and member of the House of Representatives of Japan representing Kanagawa Prefecture. Biography Yoshiyuki Kamei was born on 30 April 1936. He graduated from Keio University in 1962. He was Ministry of Agricultu ...

stopped a potential game-tying play by making an impressive catch at the wall to retire

Kazuo Matsui is a Japanese retired professional baseball player who played as a shortstop and is the current manager of the Saitama Seibu Lions. He is a switch-hitter. Matsui signed with the New York Mets on December 17, 2003, becoming the first Japanese i ...

with runners on first and second with two outs.

Game 2

Tying the Series at a game a piece, Eagle's ace

Masahiro Tanaka is a Japanese professional baseball player for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles of the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). From 2007 through 2013, he played for the Eagles in NPB. Tanaka was posted by the Eagles after the 2013 season to be si ...

earned a victory in Game 2 by striking out 12 in his complete game performance. The game's first run came with

Ginji Akaminai , known mononymously as , is a former Japanese professional baseball infielder for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles in Japan's Nippon Professional Baseball or NPB is the highest level of baseball in Japan. Locally, it is often called , mea ...

's RBI single for the Eagles in the sixth inning. In the bottom of the next inning, with runners on first and third, Kazuya Fujita hit a ground ball to second base. Giants' second baseman

Takayuki Terauchi is a Japanese Nippon Professional Baseball player for the Yomiuri Giants in Japan's Central League The or is one of the two professional baseball leagues that constitute Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan. The winner of the league cham ...

fielded the ball and threw it to first base in an attempt to throw out a head-first-sliding Fujita. First base umpire Kenjiro Mori called Fujita safe, however replays showed that he should have been out as the ball reached the base first. Giants' manager

Tatsunori Hara is a Japanese former professional baseball player, and the current manager of the Yomiuri Giants baseball team in Nippon Professional Baseball. Career Hara played for the Giants during his professional baseball career from to . He won the Cen ...

came onto the field to argue the call with Mori but the call stood. Mori's blown call was exaggerated when Terauchi hit what should have been a game-tying solo home run the next inning.

Game 3

After collecting only two runs on nine hits in each of the Series' first two games, the Eagles capitalized on 13 hits in Game 3 getting five runs and the victory. Giants' starter

Toshiya Sugiuchi is a Japanese baseball player. He is a left-handed starting pitcher for the Yomiuri Giants. Sugiuchi was the Eiji Sawamura Award winner in . He has had some of the most international experience of any active Japanese baseball player, pitching ...

was removed from the game in only the second inning after giving up four runs. Eagles' starter

held the Giants to just four singles and no runs through 5 innings before leaving the game after being hit in the left foot with a ball hit by

Shinnosuke Abe is a Japanese former professional baseball player who spent his entire 19-year career with Nippon Professional Baseball's Yomiuri Giants, serving as the team's captain from 2007 to 2014. He has twice been named the MVP of the Nippon Professional ...

. Mima was relieved by Ken Ray, who pitched though the eighth inning and gave up the Giants' only run, a

Kenji Yano Kenji Yano (矢野謙次, born September 21, 1980) is a Japanese people, Japanese former professional baseball outfielder. He played for the Yomiuri Giants and the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters. After his retirement in 2018, Yano was sent to th ...

leadoff, solo home run in the eighth inning.

Game 4

Game 5

After blowing a save in the ninth inning, the Eagles came back to win Game 5 in 10 innings. They led the majority of the game after scoring two runs off of Tetsuya Utsumi in the second. Rakuten starter Wataru Karashima and Takahiro Norimoto pitched five innings a piece. Karashima got through the first four innings without giving up a hit and allowed his first and only hit in the fifth inning. Relieving Karashima, Norimoto blew the game's save opportunity in the ninth only to earn a win in the tenth inning. Yomiuri's

scored both of the Giants' runs off of Norimoto. His first RBI came from a solo home run in the seventh inning and his game-tying RBI hit came in the ninth sending the game into extra innings. In the top of the tenth inning, Norimoto drew a lead off walk from Yomiuri reliever

. He went on to reach second base on a sacrifice bunt by Takero Okajima. Next, Kazuya Fujita was hit in the calf with a pitch and took first base. Rakuten then took the lead with a single from

. On Akaminai's single, Fujita went from first to third but was then taken out and replaced by pinch runner Toshihito Abe. Abe then scored on

Andruw Jones Andruw Rudolf Jones (; born April 23, 1977) is a Curaçaoan former baseball outfielder and designated hitter who played 17 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB), most notably for the Atlanta Braves. Jones also played for the Los Angeles Dodgers, ...

' infield single giving the Eagles an insurance run. Norimoto pitched a hitless bottom half of the inning to win the game.

Game 6

Game 7

Rakuten brought home their first Japan Series win after their Game 7 home win over the Giants. Eagles' starter Mima pitched for six innings and gave up only one hit, struck out five and walked three. Norimoto then relieved Mima to pitch two scoreless innings, and Tanaka came in to close out the ninth earning him a save. Tanaka's one-inning save came the day after he pitched a 160-pitch complete game loss. The Giants' offensive problems throughout the series hurt them again in Game 7 where they hit only 5 singles and were shutout. The Eagles immediately took the lead in the first inning on a run-scoring error by Giants' shortstop

Hayato Sakamoto is a Japanese professional baseball shortstop with the Yomiuri Giants of Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). In , Sakamoto became the first player in Giants franchise history to start a season opener while under the age of 20 since Hideki Mats ...

. The following inning, they added to their lead with Takero Okajima’s RBI-double. The final insurance run came with

Akihisa Makida Akihisa Makida (牧田明久, born June 3, 1982) is a Japanese former professional baseball outfielder and currently second squad coach for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles of the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). He played for the Golden Eagle ...

's solo home run in the fourth inning.

References

External links

Official Website
{{Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles Japan Series Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles Yomiuri Giants