The Tokyo Yakult Swallows () are a Japanese professional

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

team competing in

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 ...

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 ...

. Based in

Shinjuku is a special ward in Tokyo, Japan. It is a major commercial and administrative centre, housing the northern half of the busiest railway station in the world (Shinjuku Station) and the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, the administration ...

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.468 ...

, they are one of two professional baseball teams based in Tokyo, the other being the

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 ...

. They have won 8 Central League championships and 6 Japan Series championships. Since 1964, they play their games at

Meiji Jingu Stadium The is a baseball stadium in Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan. It opened in 1926 and holds 37,933 spectators. Property of the Meiji Shrine, it is the home field of the Tokyo Yakult Swallows professional baseball team. It also hosts college baseball, inc ...

. The Swallows are named after their corporate owners,

Yakult Honsha Yakult Honsha is a Japanese company founded in 1955 to sell its flagship product, Yakult—a beverage made using industrial lactic milk, a bacterial strain discovered by Minoru Shirota in the 1920s. Yakult Honsha is a multinational corporatio ...

. From 1950 to 1965, the team was owned by the former

Japanese National Railways The abbreviated JNR or , was the business entity that operated Japan's national railway network from 1949 to 1987. Network Railways As of June 1, 1949, the date of establishment of JNR, it operated of narrow gauge () railways in all 46 pref ...

(known as Kokutetsu (国鉄) in Japanese) and called the Kokutetsu Swallows; the team was then owned by the newspaper ''

Sankei Shimbun The (short for ) is a daily newspaper in Japan published by the It has the seventh-highest circulation for regional newspapers in Japan. Among Japanese newspapers, the circulation is second only to ''Yomiuri Shimbun'', Seikyo Shimbun, ''Asa ...

'' from 1965 to 1968 and called the Sankei Atoms. Yakult purchased the team in 1970 and renamed it the Yakult Atoms, before renaming it again as the Yakult Swallows in 1974, and then the Tokyo Yakult Swallows in 2006.

Kokutetsu and Sankei era (1950–1969)

The franchise was established for the first time in 1950 when the team was created by the owners of what was then

(now the privatized

Japan Railways Group The Japan Railways Group, more commonly known as the or simply JR, consists of seven for-profit stock companies that took over most of the assets and operations of the government-owned Japanese National Railways (JNR) on April 1, 1987. Mo ...

). The team name was made the Kokutetsu Swallows. The team never finished with a winning record in their entire first decade of the 1950s. In 1961, the team ended up being third in the league for first time in their team history. Konkutetsu chose "Swallows" as JNR had an express railway, which at the time, was the fastest in Japan, which was named Tsubame (or

swallow The swallows, martins, and saw-wings, or Hirundinidae, are a family of passerine songbirds found around the world on all continents, including occasionally in Antarctica. Highly adapted to aerial feeding, they have a distinctive appearance. The ...

in English). Other name ideas were railway themed, such as "Service" or "Whistles". Pitcher

Masaichi Kaneda was a Japanese professional baseball pitcher of Zainichi Korean origin, one of the best-known pitchers in Japanese baseball history, and is the only Japanese pitcher to have won 400 games. He was inducted in the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame in ...

, nicknamed "The Emperor", starred for the team during this era and was the league's most dominant pitcher. Kaneda holds numerous career records in the Japanese leagues. For the Swallows, he went 14 straight seasons with at least 20 wins, led the league in strikeouts 10 times, wins three times, ERA three times, and won the

Eiji Sawamura Award The , commonly known as the Sawamura Award, is an honor bestowed upon the top starting pitcher in Nippon Professional Baseball each year. The award was originally established by Japanese magazine "Nekkyū" in 1947 to honor the career of Eiji Sawa ...

three times. Kaneda pitched for the Swallows from 1950 to 1964. In 1965, the team was bought by

and Sankei retained the Swallows name for 1 year before switching their name to the Atoms, as they were one of the leading advocates of nuclear energy and they had no ties to the original name.

Yakult era (1970–2005)

In 1970, Sankei Shimbun offloaded the team to

, and Yakult kept the Atoms name for 3 seasons before bringing back the original "Swallows" name due to petitions from fans. Sankei kept a minority stake in the team, negotiating a deal that broadcasts all Swallows home games on

Fuji TV JOCX-DTV (channel 8), branded as and colloquially known as CX, is a Japanese television station based in Odaiba, Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Owned and operated by the it is the key station of the Fuji News Network (FNN) and the Fuji Network S ...

ONE. The team won its first

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 ...

championship in 1978. In 1990,

Katsuya Nomura was a Japanese Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) catcher and manager. During his over 26-season playing career mostly spent with the Nankai Hawks (now the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks), he became one of NPB's greatest offensive catchers. He was award ...

became the new manager of Swallows, making drastic changes in the team. Although his first year with the Swallows resulted in them finishing in fifth place, the Swallows improved to third in the league the next year for the first time since 1980. From 1992 to 2001, the team won five Central League championships, prevailing in the Japan Series in 1993, 1995, 1997, and 2001. (Nomura managed the team to the first three of those championships.)

Tokyo Yakult era (2006–present)

In 2006, Tokyo was added to the team name, resulting in the team name of Tokyo Yakult Swallows, and the logo of

was added to the uniform for the first time since the Kokutetsu era. The team maintained a

winning percentage In sports, a winning percentage is the fraction of games or matches a team or individual has won. The statistic is commonly used in standings or rankings to compare teams or individuals. It is defined as wins divided by the total number of match ...

of .500, and ended up in third place in the league. 2011 was an impressive year for the Swallows. In April, the Swallows topped the

and kept 1st place until September when the

Chunichi Dragons The are a professional baseball team based in Nagoya, the chief city in the Chūbu region of Japan. The team plays in the Central League of Nippon Professional Baseball. They have won the Central League pennant nine times (most recently in 2011) ...

climbed to win in the pennant race, ultimately leaving the Swallows in 2nd place in the

. The Swallows entered the

Climax Series The is the current annual playoff system implemented by Japan's Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). It determines which team from the Central League (CL) and from the Pacific League (PL) will advance to compete for the championship in the Japan ...

in 2009, and faced the

for the stage 1, which ultimately resulted in a 2–1 victory. Swallows advanced for their first time into stage 2 and faced the defending

champions, the

. The Swallows eventually lost against the Dragons by 2–4, ending their postseason. At the end of season,

Hirotoshi Ishii Hirotoshi Ishii (石井弘寿, born September 14, 1977) is a Japanese baseball player. He currently plays as a relief pitcher for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows. He has repeatedly expressed a desire to play in the majors, and several teams have show ...

retired from the team. In 2012,

Norichika Aoki is a Japanese professional baseball outfielder for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows of Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). He previously played for the Milwaukee Brewers, Kansas City Royals, San Francisco Giants, Seattle Mariners, Houston Astros, Toro ...

was posted to the Milwaukee Brewers. On 19 March 2012, the main office was moved to Kita- Aoyama which is located close to the

from Higashi-

Shinbashi , sometimes transliterated Shimbashi, is a district of Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Name Read literally, the characters in Shinbashi mean "new bridge". History The area was the site of a bridge built across the Shiodome River in 1604. The river was la ...

. In 2013, Swallows outfielder

Wladimir Balentien Wladimir Ramon Balentien (; born July 2, 1984), nicknamed "Coco", is a Curaçaoan-Dutch professional baseball outfielder who is currently a free agent. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Seattle Mariners and Cincinnati Reds, and in ...

broke the NPB single-season home run record, finishing the season with 60 home runs. This was majorly due to the league secretly introducing a more juiced ball that allowed more home runs to be scored, which caused three-term NPB commissioner Ryozo Kato to resign when the juiced ball was found about. The Swallows finished the 2015 regular season with the Central League's best record and defeated the Yomiuri Giants in the Climax Series to advance to the

, where they lost to the

Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks The are a Japanese professional baseball team based in Fukuoka, Fukuoka Prefecture. They compete in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) as a member of the Pacific League. The team was formerly known as the Nankai Hawks and was based in Osaka. ...

in five games. The Swallows clinched the 2021 Central League pennant on 26 October 2021 with a 5-1 victory over Yokohama DeNA BayStars, coupled with Hanshin Tigers losing 4-0 to Chunichi Dragons on the same night. The victory clinched the pennant with two games to spare in the regular season. This allowed them to advance to the final stage of the Climax Series, sweeping the Yomiuri Giants, 3-0, to advance to the Japan Series. They eventually won the series against the Orix Buffaloes in six games to win the Japan Series, their first since 2001. They backed it up in 2022 with an 80-59-4 record, winning the 2022 Central League pennant and returning to the

by sweeping the Hanshin Tigers in the 2022 Central League Climax Series, once again facing the Orix Buffaloes. Third baseman Munetaka Murakami broke the Japanese-born single season

home run In baseball, a home run (abbreviated HR) is scored when the ball is hit in such a way that the batter is able to circle the bases and reach home plate safely in one play without any errors being committed by the defensive team. A home run i ...

record in 2022 with 56 home runs, surpassing

Sadaharu Oh Sadaharu Oh (Japanese: , ''Ō Sadaharu''; born May 20, 1940), also known as Wang Chen-chih (), is a Japanese-born former baseball player and manager Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005)"Ō Sadaharu"in ''Japan Encyclopedia'', p. 758. who ...

's record of 55 set in 1964.

Gallery

File:2019 神宮 (46809466734).jpg, View of Meiji Jingu Baseball Stadium, a franchise of Tokyo Yakult Swallows File:Meiji Jingu Stadium.JPG, Swallows fans supporting hold an umbrella in 2006 File:Gk ryoDSC 93972.jpg,

Tetsuto Yamada is a Japanese professional baseball infielder for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows of Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). Yamada made his NPB debut in 2012 with Yakult. He has won the Central League MVP award, has received the Best Nine Award six times, ...

(2011–present) in 2018 File:Gk ryoIMG 5603.jpg, Munetaka Murakami in 2018

Current roster

Honoured numbers

*1:

Tsutomu Wakamatsu is a Japanese former baseball player, coach, and manager for the Yakult Swallows in Nippon Professional Baseball or NPB is the highest level of baseball in Japan. Locally, it is often called , meaning ''Professional Baseball''. Outside Ja ...

(若松勉) *6: Shinya Miyamoto (宮本慎也) *8: Katsuo Osugi (大杉勝男) *27: Atsuya Furuta (古田敦也) – Player manager in 2006–2007

Former players

(1950–1964) (1972–1989) (1968–1985) (1971–1981) (1970–1985) (1973) (1974–1977) (1976–1978) (1978–1979) (1987) (1990) (1991–1992) (1993) (1995–1996) (1997–1998) (1999–2002) (1999–2000) (2007–2011)

MLB players

Masato Yoshii , nicknamed "Oiyan", is a retired Japanese professional baseball player, former pitching coach and current manager for the Chiba Lotte Marines of Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). He pitched in Major League Baseball from 1998 to 2002. Career Y ...

(1998–2002) * Kazuhisa Ishii (2002–2005) *

Shingo Takatsu Shingo Takatsu (高津臣吾, ''Takatsu Shingo'') (born November 25, 1968) is a Japanese professional baseball pitcher and manager. He had a short stint with the Chicago White Sox where he was the closer for two seasons until struggles closing ...

(2004–2005) *

Akinori Iwamura is a former Japanese baseball infielder, who currently is a manager for the Fukushima Red Hopes in Japan's Baseball Challenge League. He made his Major League debut with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays in 2007. He earned the nickname Aki while in M ...

(2007–2010) *

Ryota Igarashi is a Japanese former professional baseball pitcher. He has played in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows, Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks and in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the New York Mets, Toronto Blue Jays and New Y ...

(2010–2012) *

(2012–2017) *

Tony Barnette Anthony Lee Barnette (born November 9, 1983) is an American former professional baseball pitcher. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Texas Rangers and Chicago Cubs and in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) for the Tokyo Yakult Swal ...

(2016–2019)

Managers

* (1950–1953) * (1954–1955) * (1956–1960) * (1961–1962) * (1963) * (1964–1965) * (1966–1967) * (1968–1970) * (1971–1973) * (1974–1976) * (1976–1979) * (1980–1984) * (1984–1986) * (1987–1989) * (1990–1998) * (1999–2005) * (2006–2007) - Player Manager * (2008–2010) * (2011–2014, 2018–2019) * (2015–2017) * (2020–present)

Mascots

The team's mascot is a black swallow with a red face named Tsubakuro (ツバクロ). He is known for his feuds with the Orix Buffaloes mascots. The number on the back of his uniform is "2896" as opposed to 111/222 used by

Buffalo Bull The Buffalo Bulls are the intercollegiate athletic teams that represent the University at Buffalo (UB) in Buffalo, New York. The Bulls compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the NCAA Division I, Division I level as a ...

and

Buffalo Bell The are a Nippon Professional Baseball team formed as a result of the 2004 Nippon Professional Baseball realignment by the merger of the Orix BlueWave of Kobe, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan, and the Osaka Kintetsu Buffaloes of Osaka, Osaka Prefect ...

, the Buffaloes' mascots. There is also a female swallow mascot named Tsubami. She wears a skirt and may be intended as Tsubakuro's little sister, just as Bell is Bull's little sister. Before Tsubakuro was created, the teams mascots were Yabo and Sue-Chan (ヤー坊 & スーちゃん), who were the team mascots from 1979 to 1994. The team also has a third mascot named Torukuya, a swallow who resembles a luchador. He always carries around a parasol and a bottle of Yakult that he carries on his back. He is also the younger brother of Tsubami. The team also had a former mascot named Entaro (燕太郎), a swallow who wore a jersey and his jersey number is 8960. He was replaced by Torukuya in 2014.

References

External links

*
Tokyo Yakult Swallows official web site

Tokyo Yakult Swallows official English web site
{{Authority control Nippon Professional Baseball teams Baseball teams established in 1950 Sports teams in Tokyo 1950 establishments in Japan