Masafumi Kawaguchi (born February 19, 1973) is a former

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

ese player of

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

. He was born in Kawanishi, Hyogo and introduced to football during his senior year at San Clemente High School in California, when he moved there at the age of 17. He enrolled at

Ritsumeikan University is a private university in Kyoto, Japan, that traces its origin to 1869. With the Kinugasa Campus (KIC) in Kyoto, and Kyoto Prefecture, the university also has a satellite called Biwako-Kusatsu Campus (BKC) and Osaka-Ibaraki Campus (OIC). Tod ...

Kyoto Kyoto (; Japanese: , ''Kyōto'' ), officially , is the capital city of Kyoto Prefecture in Japan. Located in the Kansai region on the island of Honshu, Kyoto forms a part of the Keihanshin metropolitan area along with Osaka and Kobe. , the ci ...

as an international relations major. He played for seven years with the Amsterdam Admirals of

NFL Europe NFL Europe League (simply called NFL Europe and known in its final season as NFL Europa League) was a professional American football league that functioned as the developmental minor league of the National Football League (NFL). Originally f ...

from 1997 to 2004. He was named to the All-NFL Europe Team in 1999. In 1998, he was among the first four Japanese players to participate in a

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

training camp when he participated in the

Green Bay Packers The Green Bay Packers are a professional American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC North, North division. It ...

camp and played in the 1998 American Bowl in Tokyo. In 2003, he was invited to the

San Francisco 49ers The San Francisco 49ers (also written as the San Francisco Forty-Niners) are a professional American football team based in the San Francisco Bay Area. The 49ers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the league's National ...

training camp in 2003, and participated in the American Bowl exhibition game in the

Osaka is a designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the third most populous city in Japan, following Special wards of Tokyo and Yokohama. With a population of 2. ...

game between the 49ers and the

Washington Redskins The Washington Commanders are a professional American football team based in the Washington metropolitan area. The Commanders compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) N ...

. He signed with the 49ers in 2003 but was released before the start of the season. Kawaguchi played a key role on the Japanese national team that won the International Federation of American Football 1999 World Cup.

References

External links

Just Sports Stats
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kawaguchi, Masafumi 1973 births Living people American football linebackers Amsterdam Admirals players Japanese players of American football Sportspeople from Hyōgo Prefecture San Francisco 49ers players Ritsumeikan University alumni