2005 Nippon Series: Game Three

Ohhh mannnnnnn.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say the Tigers are done.

Wow! 30-2 aggregate score and counting. It seems the "mighty" Koshien has no effect on the Marines and it might as well be Chiba Marine Stadium.

Perhaps my theory of Hanshin being "found out" as an ordinary team is coming true?

10 is like the magic number for Lotte.

- 10 is like the magic number for Lotte.

Indeed it is. If they were to repeat the feat in tonight's game (which is impossible - right?) then it would be one of the most remarkable (and bizarre) results in sporting history.

But of course the Tigers have 4 more games, starting tonight, in which to change their history book entry from "the ultimate choke," to "the ultimate comeback."

No, Hanshin isn't an ordinary team - they are an exceptional team. However, any exceptional team can play poorly, and this is what is happening. Maybe they aren't even interested in the Japan Series - their play and Okada's pitcher decisions indicate that this is possible.

- No, Hanshin isn't an ordinary team - they are an exceptional team. However, any exceptional team can play poorly, and this is what is happening.

I'm sorry, but an exeptional team doesn't lose 3 games on the trot in such a manner. I think it goes beyond simply "playing poorly." An exeptional team would have run Lotte a little closer despite playing poorly.

And my "ordinary" comment just came from my (and a few friends') thoughts that the rest of the CL was weak this year rather than this current Hanshin team being world beaters. And their performances so far are leading me to believe this may be right.

- Maybe they aren't even interested in the Japan Series.

And if this is the case, this would most definately exclude them from being associated with the word "exeptional."

Either way, they'll have their chance to prove me wrong starting with tonight's performance in game 4.

- I'm sorry, but an exeptional team doesn't lose 3 games on the trot in such a manner. I think it goes beyond simply "playing poorly."

You forget they are playing an even more exceptional team. Lotte at the moment are playing beyond themselves and are unbeatable, especially in the short series. For various reasons exceptional teams can and do lose badly - even being knocked out of cups by really minor teams.

- And my "ordinary" comment just came from my (and a few friends') thoughts that the rest of the CL was weak this year rather than this current Hanshin team being world beaters. And their performances so far are leading me to believe this may be right.

I wouldn't judge the rest of the Central League by the performance of Yakult this year. The Leagues were similar in quality this year - other factors are in play here.

Well, we'll agree to differ on the exceptional team point. Though I think you may be letting your love for the Tigers cloud your judgement a little.

- I wouldn't judge the rest of the Central League by the performance of Yakult this year. The Leagues were similar in quality this year - other factors are in play here.

I wasn't judging the CL by Yakult's performance and never said I was. I was judging from the performance of all the teams I witnessed on my 30 plus trips to Jingu this season. It was just a general feeling I got this season.

Perhaps the results of the inter-league games are relevant. Whilst Lotte may have won the Series, the Pacific League total of wins were only one more than the Central League total. This is not evidence of weakness.

- This is not evidence of weakness.

The fact that Hanshin didn't have any playoffs [important games] was exposed during this Series. The score spread was a 34-4 difference between Chiba Lotte and Hanshin. The long break without any games hurt the Tigers in my opinion.

The Central League seriously needs to think about implementing a playoff system. A long time without games is not in the best interest of the CL team or the fans either, as we saw here.

- The Central League seriously needs to think about implementing a playoff system.

I totally agree with you John. But whatever playoff system it is, I think it needs to be the same for both leagues.

I wouldn't object to the same system as the PL uses. Despite it's shortcomings (that have been discussed at length on this site), I feel the extra excitement it would generate during the regular season (not to mention during the playoffs themselves) would make them worthwhile. Not to mention that they would hopefully avoid a long layoff for the CL team and thus avoiding a Japan Series mismatch as seen this year.

Of course the Pacific League could always drop their playoffs. If the same system was used in the Central League it would just compound the problems - half the clubs in two leagues involved in a playoff series? The simple fact is that the number of clubs in Japan are not enough for a viable playoff system. Until this fundemental issue is solved any playoff system is illogical.

- The simple fact is that the number of clubs in Japan are not enough for a viable playoff system. Until this fundemental issue is solved any playoff system is illogical.

I agree with you to some degree, but the flipside of this is the same small number of clubs leads to a pretty tedious second half of the season if you're not in the top two or three places. Endless games against the same 5 teams with no real excitement as you've no chance of winning the pennant (battling for a 3rd or 4th place has no incentive).

The introduction of the playoff system would drastically alter the excitement of the regular season, and I think this overides any frustration at it's "illogical" nature. It just depends which way you choose to look at it.

You make a very good point, but as has been mentioned on other threads, the third place team has the chance to get to the Japan Series with a less than 50% winning record. If the third place team doesn't have this chance, then it is just cannon fodder and the whole playoff is pointless.

The argument that playoffs alter the excitment of the regular season also misses the point of a league system. This is to determine which team is the best over a long series of games. Long overdue inter-league play has helped the excitment level, and I would like to see more of this.

For a successful playoff system to work there needs to be more leagues (an expansion to 16 teams organised in 4 leagues perhaps), or a first and second division structure with playoffs to determine who goes up or down between the leagues. Without this then the playoff system will continue to be artificial and, in the case of the Pacific League, it will be exposed as such when the third place team actually wins (which will happen).

- You make a very good point, but as has been mentioned on other threads, the third place team has the chance to get to the Japan Series with a less than 50% winning record.

Agreed. It's not ideal, but I'd be willing to put up with this.

- The argument that playoffs alter the excitment of the regular season also misses the point of a league system. This is to determine which team is the best over a long series of games.

Again, true. But the small size of Japan's leagues coupled with the "first place only" pennant system can be pretty tedious for the majority of teams. Unlike other sports, pro-yakyu doesn't have any other competitions, such as an on going knockout cup (such as in Football/Soccer) to distract from the league system, and give hope to those not doing so well in the league standings. So as I said before, if your team isn't within a shout of first place, then the latter part of the season can be mighty tedious for them and their fans.

- Long overdue inter-league play has helped the excitment level, and I would like to see more of this.

Totally agree here, it was a revelation as far as I was concerned - certainly the highlight of the season for me.

- For a successful playoff system to work there needs to be more leagues (an expansion to 16 teams organised in 4 leagues perhaps), or a first and second division structure with playoffs to determine who goes up or down between the leagues.

All great ideas, but I can't really see any of them happening anytime soon.

- Without this then the playoff system will continue to be artificial and, in the case of the Pacific League, it will be exposed as such when the third place team actually wins (which will happen).

Again, I know it's not ideal, but I am willing to overlook the deficiencies for what I feel would be an increase in excitement - throughout the regular season right down to the wire, and during the playoffs themselves. Sure it would devalue the leagues as "true-leagues" (for want of a better phrase), but I really believe it would provide way more excitement than the current system. And after all, isn't that the point of watching sport?

- Again, I know it's not ideal, but I am willing to overlook the deficiencies for what I feel would be an increase in excitement - throughout the regular season right down to the wire, and during the playoffs themselves. Sure it would devalue the leagues as "true-leagues" (for want of a better phrase), but I really believe it would provide way more excitement than the current system. And after all, isn't that the point of watching sport?

I think that what is missing from the pure "sport is excitment" statement is integrity. We also want our sporting competitions to be legitimate and have an element of fairness. Without this excitment by itself is meaningless. If we look at MLB the reason their playoffs work is that the league is big enough and the league winners remain league winners. They compete for the right to play in the American Championship, but retain their hard won league titles. In the Pacific League, the winning team does not get its deserved reward - the league title, thus the league is rendered illegitimate.

This is part of the reason why the Pacific League is always second place (not in performance) in the Japanese baseball viewing public's affections. A time will also come when the third place team wins the Pacific League title - this will be a serious blow to the Pacific League and will completely shatter it's credibility. These are not deficiencies that should be overlooked, they relate to the fundemental values of sporting competition and its legitimacy.

I pretty much agree with you on all points, but still see myself leaning toward being in favour of a 3 team play-off.

As long as the teams benefit from their league positions by getting home series, head starts (starting the series with a game or two lead depending on how far ahead in the standings they were) then I think it's fine.

You may see a third place team winning the title as ruining the league's credibility, but I would see it as an underdog team overcoming the odds to triumph. And while at first it may seem strange, I think after a number of years of both leagues using the same playoff system, it will seem perfectly normal. The league will be seen as a means to qualify for, and get the best possible advantage to win, the end of season playoffs.

Again, I can totally see your point of view, but feel a playoff system, well weighted toward rewarding a higher league finish, is a more exciting proposition than what we [the Central League] have now.

I understand your argument, but I think that an underdog team has to do more to be admitted to a Japan Series. I wrote earlier of expanding leagues or two divisions. However, given this won't happen, a cup structure would be a good solution.

The top team in the league would win the league - this would reward the best over a period and retain the league's credibility. After the league finished there would be a Central League Cup in which the top four teams would compete (semi-finals and final). The cup winner and the league winner would then play each other for the right to compete in the Japan Series (unless of course the Cup and league winners were the same team). Lots of excitment, especially if it was a sudden death play off (one game only) for the Cup. There is no artificiality here as the team going through to the Japan Series would have proven that it was worth it by winning one or two serious competitions. Furthermore, it would involve four teams from each league and generate a lot of excitment.

With the Pacific league playoffs you are still faced with the fact that if the third place team has a winning streak and takes the playoffs it may have a less than 50% winning record. It has not proven that it has the right to enter the Japan Series. This is not acceptable as the teams in the Japan Series should at least demonstrate that they have a right to be there.

To comment on the current structure of the Pacific League I asked one of NHK's top sports negotiators why the playoffs weren't shown on television. His reply was "it's the Pacific League." Most of Japan does not seem to regard this structure as legitimate.

Your end of season cup idea is very interesting and I would be all for such an idea. Any idea that helps involve more of the teams is fine by me.

But one point - surely if a fourth place team enters such a cup and goes on to win it, and then beats the League Champion, you could still have a team who has a sub .500 record contesting the Japan Series. But the fact that they had won a legitimate competition (the Cup) would make that acceptable? But a sub .500 third place team making it all the way through a Pacific League "weighted" style playoff system is not acceptable? They sound like two very similar situations to me, apart from the fact that in the first scenario the losing CL Champion still retains the right to be called the CL Champion and in the second scenario they end up with nothing to show for their labors.

Anyway, an interesting idea all the same - if only the powers that be would have the gumption to make such drastic changes.

And as for the NHK negotiators comments, I don't think such comments are necessarily a reflection on the playoff system (though of course, it was not me talking to them) but more a reflection on the majority of the Japanese public's view on the Pacific League going back some time, way before the playoffs were introduced. Until the PL contains one of the Yomiuri Giants or Hanshin Tigers it will always be viewed as the CLs poor relation, playoffs or no playoffs.

You raise an interesting point, but there is a fundemental difference. The team with the under .500 record goes as the cup holder, not as league champion. It would have demonstrated it's right to be there by winning a seperate trophy and then beating the league champion. The credibility problem with the Pacific League is that a team with an under .500 record could play in the Nippon Series as league champion.

You are right about the attitude towards the Pacific League being well entrenched, but the playoff system in use has done nothing to lessen these attitudes. Where the Pacific League will gain respect is through the Inter-League games.

I was in favor of holding the playoffs for some time, but now that I've seen how the Series turned out, I'm really beginning to see otherwise.

In my view, the real key is that the Tigers didn't perform so poorly in the Series because they weren't involved in the Playoffs; no, the Marines were able to overwhelm the Tigers because they were able to play extra-competitive games that really served as preparation for the Series, something that the Tigers didn't have. In mathematical terms it looks something like this: games > lack of games.

Granted, the Marines did very well to win three separate series on their way to the title. But what does that tell us about them - did they intend to finish top of the league, or were they a team that was built to win in the post-season? They could have finished third and had the same type of run that they just completed.

The regular season isn't going to count for anything if we have to use the playoffs to decide it. Each league only has six teams. There is something wrong in giving a third (or even second) place team a chance to win the pennant after a 140+ game season. Imagine the 2003 Tigers - a very dominant team - being robbed of the league championships because they lost a short series to a team that finished more than 15 games behind them.

Also, the three-league, four-team format that the majority of the posters here seems to favor, won't solve the problem. While the inter-league matchups may help, fans will only tolerate watching their team play three teams over and over again so much. Also, that format runs the risk of having one league looking very similar to this year's version of the NL West. If all four teams do poorly in the inter-league matchups, there is a chance that the league winners will struggle to reach .500.

Anyways, I'm not trying to say that the Marines didn't deserve the championship - I'll be the first one to congratulate them - but they were definitely helped by the system that is in place today. The way we have the league setup now, it is built to handle only a #1 vs. #1 matchup.

Just one or two comments:

- The regular season isn't going to count for anything if we have to use the playoffs to decide it.

No, that's not right. In fact it's exactly the opposite. Without playoffs a large slice of the regular season is irrelevant anyway. For four out of six Central League teams, this year's season ended a long time ago, as they had no chance of winning the league. And in 2003, the last two months of the season were meaningful for the Tigers only. Playoffs make more of the regular season for more of the teams (and fans) count for something.

Indeed, incorporating home park advantage for the top team at each stage plus the one game advantage for teams finishing 5+ games ahead in the regular season makes regular season performances critical (just ask the Hawks, who have failed both times to surpasss that 5+ plateau, directly leading to their failure to win the league).

The Pacific League playoffs are a much better system than what happens in MLB, where the clock is essentially reset, putting even the wild card teams on virtually the same footing as the best performers in the league. In short, not all playoff systems are equal.

- Also, the three-league, four-team format that the majority of the posters here seems to favor, won't solve the problem. While the inter-league matchups may help, fans will only tolerate watching their team play three teams over and over again so much.

But why do they need to play the same teams over and over again? We need to break out of the MLB mindset here. Why can't each team play the other 11 more or less the same number of times (regardless of league)?

Of course one might argue that it would be just as effective, then, to have a single league, and that argument has something going for it. One league and playoffs consisting of four or five teams would certainly appeal to me.

Anyway, the main issue is the gaps between games. All they need to do is finish the season on time with the use of doubleheaders, and then compress the playoff schedule to eliminate the dead time. That's the way to go in my view.

- Without playoffs a large slice of the regular season is irrelevant anyway.

The point I'm trying to make is that the playoffs cheapen the value of the regular season. The PL teams could lose their ambitions of winning the league in order to gain the third and final spot in the playoffs. Finishing .500 or below shouldn't be a cause for enthusiasm, but the current format that the PL uses practically encourages mediocrity during the regular season.

Let's put it this way: The hard work put out during a 140-game season should not come down to a handful of games, especially in a league that small.

- But why do they need to play the same teams over and over again? We need to break out of the MLB mindset here. Why can't each team play the other 11 more or less the same number of times (regardless of league)?

While that would be a welcome addition should the NPB decide on that kind of league formation, the individual leagues would still be too small to make them legitimate. Preferably, both leagues would expand to at least eight teams (although I doubt if the owners would approve that). At eight teams, the argument for the playoffs would become valid; not only would it make for great races, but it all but ensures only the teams with good records will be qualified.

I have a feeling that the playoff debate will last well into next month, if not next year. I just don't see the point: why not just let the teams who finished first battle it out?

The point I'm trying to make is that the playoffs cheapen the value of the regular season.

Sure, I understand that. My point is that they enhance the value of a regular season.

I'm from Australia, and a keen rugby league fan, and so perhaps I have a bias in favor of playoffs, or semi-finals as we call them down there. I've always thought of them as a fitting and natural finale to a regular season. We used to give the championship to the first placed team, but that was in the early part of last century - it's basically the old fashioned way of doing things.

In my view, a team needs to do well in both phases of the season: the endurance part, finishing high enough at the top of the standings to enter the next stage; and then being able to handle the pressure of the playoffs, which requires a different set of skills/strategy. In my view, a team that can't do both doesn't deserve to be called champions. You obviously disagree. We just have a different philosophy I suppose.

- In my view, a team needs to do well in both phases of the season: the endurance part, finishing high enough at the top of the standings to enter the next stage; and then being able to handle the pressure of the playoffs, which requires a different set of skills/strategy.

I can partly see the want to give non-first place teams a chance to win the pennant arguement. But at the end of the day, second place is the first loser. When a team finishes second in their league, it's because they should have done better to strive for the top spot - even if they missed it by one or two games.

This year, the Tigers and the Hawks established themselves as the best teams in their respective leagues, but both teams were practically robbed of a shot at the title. It's very unfortunate, as I was really looking forward to seeing a rematch from the 2003 Series.

- We just have a different philosophy I suppose.

I think it essentially comes down to this. It's just two different ways of looking at it - some people see playoffs as cheapening the regular season, while others see them as enhancing it.

- ... lack of games.

This is not exactly true. The Tigers essentially had a long bye to prepare for the Series, which could have worked in their favour. It just happened to be that PL teams took the Japan Series in the first two years of playoff compeition, but this is far too small a sample size to prove that playing extra competitive games (and causing fatigue) is superior to getting a bye and resting (and getting "rusty").

Past performance in various pro sports around the world seem to indicate that the difference between rest and compeititive games before a championship game(s) seems to be about even. If you have any data to prove otherwise, it'll be interesting to see it.

I'm in California and trying to find out if Dan Serafini, who plays for the Marines, has played or is going to play in this Series. Can anyone out there help me with the information?

Thank you, Ninerdame.

Serafini has been announced as the starting pitcher for Game Four tonight at 6:15 JST. Use the "Live!" link above to tune into the English audio broadcast (when the game is going on), hopefully someone will relay the happenings to the "Chat" link above. And after the game, if I don't forget to record it, you can download the game in its entirety in MP3 format (see "Live!" link above for more information).

Hope this helps.

It really helps. Thank you so much!

Ninerdame

Hi! I posted too soon. I do thank you for the reply but the "live" link could not be displayed. It has occured to me that I am many hours behind and the game is over. I feel like such a dope not to have realized that before. All I can do is hope the Marines won and that Danny pitched well.

Thanks Again,

Ninerdame