Voting for the Mazda All-Star Game 2012 will take place between May 22 and June 17 at stadiums; participating convenience stores, ticket agencies, and book stores; snail mail; and internet.

The three games this year will take place at Kyocera Dome (July 20), Botchan Stadium (July 21), and Iwate Municipal Stadium (July 23).

Tickets for LEncore members (Lawson Tickets) will have first dibs on tickets (June 3 to June 8).  Pre-request advance order tickets (Lawson Tickets) will go on sale between June 9 and June 12.  Advance lottery tickets between June 24 and June 27.  Regular tickets will go on sale beginning on July 8.

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Practice Uniforms

The NPB announced today that Mazda will be sponsoring the All-Star Series for the fifth year in row.

The All-Star Series is scheduled to take place at Kyocera Dome Osaka (July 20), Botchan Stadium in Matsuyama (July 21), and Iwate Baseball Stadium in Morioka (July 23).

The NPB also announced that a Samurai Japan Charity Auction will take place between March 19 (12:00) and March 25 (23:00) at Yahoo! Japan Auction and Rakuten Auction.  Proceeds from the auction will be donated to efforts in northern Japan.

The NPB will play one of their three 2013 All-Star Games in Fukushima.  Possible locations within Fukushima include Fukushima City, Iwaki City, and Koriyama City.  This is part of the NPB's plan to help support areas that were hit by the Tohoku Earthquake/Tsunami.

Last year, the NPB held one of their three All-Star Games in Sendai, Miyagi.  This year one of the games will take place in Morioka, Iwate.

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The following items were discussed/decided during today's NPB executive committee meeting:

• Rental players and disabled lists will not be introduced this season.  Discussions to implement them in future seasons will continue.
• NPB received permission to rent out Ikusei players (excluding first year Ikusei players) to Independent League teams, up to four players from one NPB team and up to five players per Independent League teams.  Players can be rented out and swapped out at any point during the season.  NPB teams will be responsible for player salaries. (Hiroshima Carp suggestion)
• Yi-Hao Lin (Yomiuri) will be eligible for the Rookie of the Year award.

UPDATE 3/2 @ 2:13pm - Ikusei players can be rented out to teams that belong to either the Shikoku Island League plus or the Baseball Challenge League.

The NPB announced a number of key dates today:

7/20 (Friday) - All-Star Series, Game 1 at Kyocera Dome

7/21 (Saturday) - All-Star Series, Game 2 at Botchan Stadium in Matsuyama

7/23 (Monday) - All-Star Series, Game 3 at Iwate Baseball Stadium in Morioka

10/27 (Saturday) - Nippon Series, Game 1 at Central League Winner Stadium

A number of personnel from the NPB, including secretary general Kunio Shimoda, visited Iwate prefectural governor Takuya Tasso and the prefectural offices earlier today in order to formally tell them of their plan to play an All-Star game in Morioka, Iwate on 7/23/2012 as part of the NPB's plan to help support the reconstruction of northern Japan.  This will be a first time the NPB plays an All-Star game in Iwate.

Akita House of Councillors member Hiroo Ishii, Akita prefectural governor Norihisa Satake, and Kita mayor Motomu Hozumi dropped by the NPB offices in Tokyo and met with NPB commissioner Ryozo Kato and requested that Akita be considered as a site for a future All-Star Game.

"If [the NPB] is going to play 3 games [for the All-Star Series again] in 2013 as a means to help revitalize the Tohoku region, I'd like them to consider Akita for one game," said Satake.

Ishii added, "Akita has yet to host [an All-Star game] and I think it would be good for the NPB.  I also want to give the kids a chance to see [an All-Star] game."

The NPB announced today that they raised a total 32,435,291 yen (46 items) via their Mazda All-Star Game 2011 Charity Auction.

The entire amount was sent to the Japanese Red Cross (specifically, towards reconstruction efforts in northern Japan).

Top 5 Winning Bids

Two All-Star games are currently on the 2012 schedule -- one game at Matsuyama and the other at Jingu.  The NPB executive committee is now discussing the possibility of playing a third All-Star game for charity in either Fukushima or Iwate.

UPDATE 9/6 @ 1:39pm - It appears that instead of playing an All-Star game at Jingu Stadium, where a game could get rained out, the league will turn to playing a game at Kyocera Dome.  So the schedule would be: Game 1 @ Kyocera Dome, Game 2 @ Matsuyama, and Game 3 @ Tohoku Region.  Iwate appears to be the favorite.  A final decision will likely be reached during an owner's meeting on 10/7.

The league is also thinking about playing a special charity game next year in March that could involve a team of NPB players playing a team of KBO players.

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2011 Season

Last year, the NPB decided to play three All-Star games this year in order to help secure player retirement funds and to increase revenue.  The three games were originally scheduled for Nagoya Dome, Tokyo Dome, and QVC Marine.  But after the March 11 earthquakes, the league began discussing the possibility of moving one of the games to Kleenex Stadium (they needed to work out scheduling issues with the Miyagi High School Baseball Federation) in the hopes of revitalizing and reinvigorating northern Japan.  In the end, the All-Star game at Tokyo Dome was canceled and the NPB played Game 1 at Nagoya Dome, Game 2 at QVC Marine, and Game 3 at Kleenex Stadium.

The Mazda All-Star Game 2011 Charity Auction started today.  Two versions of each players' uniforms (club and practice uniforms) are available through the auction. The auctions will run through to 8/16. Items have also been split between two online auction sites: Rakuten Auction and Yahoo Auction.  Proceeds from the auction will go towards relief and reconstruction efforts in northern Japan.

Yoshinori Sato (YAK), Sho Nakata (HAM), and Yuki Karakawa (LOT) ate dinner together the night before Game 3 of the All-Star series.  This was apparently when Yoshinori told Nakata that he would challenge him with nothing but fastballs.

Yoshinori's invited guests to Game 3: his parents and Izumi Saito's parents.

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Matt Murton (HAN) safely collected a hit in all three All-Star games and became the first foreign Hanshin Tiger (second overall in franchise history) to do so since Mike Reinbach in 1979.  And the last Tiger player to collect hits in 3 straight All-Star games: Akinobu Mayumi in 1982.

Murton is also the 5th foreign player in ASG history to collect hits in three straight games -- behind Haruo Handa, Don Blazer, Reinbach, and Roberto Petagine.

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A number of players, include Yu Darvish (HAN), Munenori Kawasaki (SOF), and Masahiro Tanaka (RAK), ate dinner together on Thursday (7/21) night in Nagoya.  Tanaka was also picking Darvish's brain on how to throw a curve.

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Yuki Saito (HAM) became the 10th rookie in ASG history (including Minoru Murayama, Hiroshi Gondo, and Tsuneo Horiuchi) to make two or more appearances without allowing a run.

Game 1: 1.2 IP, 22 NP, 7 BF, 3 H, 0 SO, 0 BB, 0 R, 0 ER

Game 3: 1.0 IP, 9 NP, 3 BF, 0 H, 1 SO, 0 BB, 0 R, 0 ER

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At 38 years and 11 months, Atsunori Inaba (HAM) became the second oldest player to win an ASG MVP award.  The oldest: Choji Murata at 39 years and 8 months in 1989.  He also became the first Fighter to hit 2 homers in an All-Star series since Isao Harimoto (1962), Toshizo Sakamoto (1972), Katsuo Osugi (1972), and Junichi Kashiwabara (1982).

Inaba also told reporters that he might donate some/all his MVP Award money (3M yen) to help support children in northern Japan.

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Of the 25 pitches Yoshinori Sato (YAK) threw yesterday, 23 were fastballs.

1st inning

Munenori Kawasaki (SOF): fastball (150km/h) - ball; fastball (152km/h) - ground out to short

Yuichi Honda (SOF): fastball (150km/h) - strike looking; fastball (152km/h) - infield single (toward second)

Atsunori Inaba (HAM): fastball (148km/h) - ball; fastball (152km/h) - 2 run homer to right

Takeshi Yamasaki (RAK): fastball (150km/h) - ball; fastball (151km/h) - ball; fastball (153km/h) - ball; fastball (146km/h) strike swinging; fastball (153km/h) fouled off; fastball (154km/h) strikeout swinging.

Nobuhiro Matsuda (SOF): fastball (152km/h) - strike looking; slider (137km/h) - ball; fastball (151km/h) - ground out to short

2nd inning

Takahiro Okada (ORI): fastball (149km/h) - strike looking; slider (132km/h) - ball; fastball (148km/h) - strike swinging; fastball (151km/h) - single to right

Sho Nakata (HAM): fastball (153km/h) - fouled off; fastball (151km/h) - fouled off; fastball (153km/h) - ball; fastball (152km/h) - double play

Yoshio Itoi (HAM): fastball (151km/h) - fouled off; fastball (151km/h) - ground out to second

Note: Nikkan Sports mentions that Yoshinori hit 155km/h on the radar gun at least twice (first and third pitch to Nakata) and Sport Hochi notes that Yoshinori hit 155km/h when he struck out Yamasaki.  Incidentally, the radar gun readings I've quoted above are from Yahoo Sports Japan.

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Tsuyoshi Wada (SOF) hit 148km/h on the radar gun yesterday (broke his previous high of 146km/h).

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The player's association invited 1,000 Self-Defense Force Troops (involved in providing support to quake/tsunami hit areas) to Game 3 of the All-Star series.  Their invitation included a ticket to the game (4,800 yen), a meal ticket (2,000 yen), and various other things like t-shirts (total of about 8,000 yen a person).  The money was taken out of the money all 64 players (including foreign players) paid 200,000 yen to participate in Game 3.