Draft 2015 Liveblogging!

EDIT: Liveblogging part has been moved to below the draft result table; pre-draft comments still at top.  As of 5:50pm Oct 23 PST, the entire draft result table is finished, including ikusei!

I was in Japan 2 weeks ago, so I did manage to buy a few of the draft magazines, so that should help with player backgrounds, although since they publish them before the deadline for guys submitting their draft-hopeful 志望届 intent letters, about half of the guys in the magazines aren't actually going into the draft.  Shrug.  I'll hopefully catch a stream online of the TV part, but otherwise I'll just be watching the picks come in on various news sources such as Nikkan Sports, Sponichi, Sanspo, etc as usual.

Not sure who I'm really emotionally invested in this year aside from the Sanko boys (please for the love of god do not let Takayama go to the Giants), maybe Ohshiro-kun (Koji that is, I've given up on Motoshi ever getting drafted now, sadly), and a bunch of the industrial league guys.  Well, and like everyone I wonder what'll happen to Rui Okoe, and another lesser-known half kid in the list named Julius Higuma.  (BTW, for the three of you who might wonder what ever happened to Teikyo's Naville Ariga, he apparently works at a Maruhan store in Sendai...)

Predraft update 8pm: Shun Takayama broke his wrist on Sunday, apparently, though it was only discovered and in the news today.  Specifically, he broke the hamate bone in his wrist; after reading about it on Wikipedia it doesn't sound that bad, apparently this just happens to golfers/baseball players and is often a hairline fracture that doesn't show up (infact they say he had an X-Ray after the game and it showed up normal but then an MRI later in the week showed the fracture).  However, Yakult at least has said they will still choose him in the first round.  That suits me just fine :)

Takayama is easily one of the best college batter/fielders in the draft this year, he broke the career hits record in Tokyo Big 6 by accumulating 131 hits over 4 years -- this is no small feat, the record was set at 127 hits by Shigeru Takada back in 1967 and stood for 48 years until now.  He was a member of the Nichidai Sanko team that won Koshien in 2011 and that I was a crazy enough fan of to dedicate an entire tag on here just to their team.  Even after his freshman year at Meiji I was already predicting him as the most likely guy from their team to go pro, so go figure.  I don't think this wrist injury will affect his career much.

Name                   Pos  HS/Univ/Company         T/B   DOB          Ht/Wt  
--------------------   ---  ---------------         ---   ----------   -------
Eagles
x Taiga Hirasawa
1 Rui Okoe              OF  Kanto Daiichi HS        R/R   07/21/1997   183/85
2 Ryota Yoshimochi      IF  Osaka Shogyo Univ       R/R   11/04/1993   174/64
3 Eigoro Mogi           IF  Waseda Univ             R/L   02/14/1994   171/75
4 Kengo Horiuchi        C   Shizuoka HS             R/L   04/15/1997   176/80
5 Ryota Ishibashi       P   Honda                   R/L   06/06/1991   175/77
6 Yuichi Adachi         C   Panasonic               R/R   09/22/1989   178/83
7 Itsuki Murabayashi    P   Otsuka HS               R/R   10/06/1997   180/70

i1 Takumi Deguchi       IF  Tsuda Gakuen HS         R/R   03/03/1998   175/91
i2 Hiroki Yamada        IF  Komono HS               R/L   10/04/1997   176/81

Buffaloes
1 Masataka Yoshida      OF  Aoyama Gakuin Univ      R/L   07/15/1993   172/80
2 Taisuke Kondoh        P   Panasonic               R/R   05/29/1991   178/74
3 Koji Ohshiro          IF  Rikkio Univ             R/R   06/14/1993   175/71
4 Daiki Aoyama          P   Toyota                  R/L   11/28/1994   183/84
5 Ryo Yoshida           P   Tokaidai Sagami HS      R/R   06/20/1997   181/72
6 Sena Satoh            P   Sendai Ikuei HS         R/R   06/02/1997   180/84
7 Kohei Suzuki          IF  Mitsubishi Juko Nagoya  R/R   06/20/1991   175/78
8 Ryuta Kadoya          P   J-Project               R/R   10/18/1990   175/71
9 Ken Akama             P   Saginomiya Seisakusho   R/R   11/14/1990   180/80
10 Yutaro Sugimoto      OF  JR Nishinihon           R/R   04/05/1991   190/92

i1 Takayuki Tsukada     P   Hakuoh Univ             L/L   09/26/1993   184/82
i2 Kosuke Akamatsu      C   Kagawa Olive Guyners    R/R   06/05/1992   188/113

Lions
1 Shinsaburo Tawata     P   Fuji Univ               R/R   04/13/1993   181/74
2 Seiji Kawagoe         P   Hokkai Gakuen Univ      L/L   06/30/1993   176/77
3 Shogo Noda            P   Seino Unyu              L/L   06/27/1993   167/70
4 Aito Ohtaki           OF  Hanasaki Tokuharu HS    R/R   04/06/1997   178/82
5 Tadasuke Minamikawa   P   JR Shikoku              R/R   01/13/1992   180/66
6 Keisuke Honda         P   Tohoku Gakuin Univ      R/R   04/24/1993   179/76
7 Wu Nienting           IF  Daichi Kogyo Univ       R/L   06/07/1993   178/75
8 Tsubasa Kokuba        P   Daichi Kogyo Univ       R/R   12/05/1993   181/81
9 Koki Fujita           P   Hirosaki Kogyo HS       L/L   12/11/1997   175/66
10 Naoaki Matsumoto     P   Kagawa Olive Guyners    R/R   11/14/1990   178/78

Marines
1 Taiga Hirasawa        IF  Sendai Ikuei HS         R/L   12/24/1997   176/76
2 Ryota Sekiya          P   JR Higashinihon         R/R   05/10/1991   180/82
3 Kakeru Narita         P   Akita Shogyo HS         L/L   02/03/1998   169/68
4 Taiki Tohjoh          P   JR Higashinihon         R/R   08/15/1991   176/80
5 Shu Hara              P   Senshudai Matsudo HS    R/R   12/06/1997   185/84
6 Akifumi Shigaraki     P   Miyazaki Umeda Gakuen   R/R   12/26/1991   180/83
7 Keisuke Takano        P   JR Nishinihon           R/R   12/28/1991   178/78

i1 Takamasa Ohki        IF  Kagawa Olive Guyners    R/L   11/22/1991   174/73
i2 Tomoya Kakinuma      C   Nihon Kokusai Univ      R/R   05/12/1993   180/82

Fighters
x Junpei Takahashi
x Shinnosuke Ogasawara
1 Kenta Uehara          P   Meiji Univ              L/L   03/29/1994   190/85
2 Takayuki Katoh        P   Kazusa Magic            L/L   06/03/1992   182/82
3 Kazutomo Iguchi       P   Nodai Okhotsk Univ      R/R   01/07/1994   177/80
4 Shota Hiranuma        P   Tsuruga Kehi HS         R/L   08/16/1997   178/75
5 Toyoki Tanaka         P   Nihon Bunri Univ        R/R   12/01/1993   180/88
6 Toshitake Yokoo       IF  Keio Univ               R/R   05/27/1993   175/86
7 Yuki Yoshida          P   Tokai Univ              R/R   02/16/1994   187/79
8 Yuya Himeno           P   Osaka Kaisei HS         R/R   04/02/1997   184/79

Hawks
1 Junpei Takahashi      P   Ken Gifu Shogyo HS      R/R   05/08/1997   183/76
2 Reiji Kozawa          P   Nichidai Mishima HS     R/L   03/09/1998   180/74
3 Kenta Tanigawara      C   Toyohashi Chuo HS       R/L   04/16/1997   173/79
4 Kenta Chatani         P   Teikyo #3 HS            R/R   01/16/1998   185/85
5 Kenta Kurose          C   Hatsushiba Hashimoto HS R/R   08/12/1997   180/94
6 Hikaru Kawase         OF  Oita Shogyo HS          R/L   09/15/1997   175/63

i1 Yuuto Nozawa         P   Tsukuba Shuei HS        R/L   11/06/1997
i2 Ryuya Kodama         P   Kanagawa Univ           L/L   10/09/1993
i3 Yuichi Higoshi       C   Nodai Okhotsk Univ      R/L   09/28/1993
i4 Shin Nakamura        P   Luther Gakuin HS        R/R   08/08/1997
i5 Takeshi Watanabe     P   Iizuka HS               L/L   09/09/1997

Baystars
1 Shota Imanaga         P   Komazawa Univ           L/L   09/01/1993   178/80
2 Kento Kumahara        P   Sendai Univ             R/L   10/19/1993   178/76
3 Tatsuhiro Shibata     IF  Kokugakuin Univ         R/L   12/16/1993   167/68
4 Yasutaka Tobashira    C   NTT Nishinihon          R/L   04/11/1990   178/83
5 Kakeru Ayabe          P   Kasumigaura HS          R/R   04/25/1997   189/86
6 Koki Aoyagi           OF  Osaka Toin HS           R/R   05/19/1997   183/83
7 Takuto Nogawa         P   Saginomiya Seisakusho   L/L   09/06/1991   172/75

i1 Keisho Amiya         C   Chiba Eiwa HS           R/R   10/03/1997   183/82
i2 Musashi Yamamoto     IF  Kyushu Kokusaidai HS    R/R   02/17/1998   188/90
i3 Jo Tamura            P   Kansai Gakuin Univ      R/R   11/20/1992   185/86


Dragons
x 1 Junpei Takahashi
1 Shinnosuke Ogasawara  P   Tokaidai Sagami HS      L/L   10/08/1997   180/83 
2 Yu Satoh              P   Tohoku Fukushi Univ     R/L   06/29/1993   187/85
3 Takuya Kinoshita      C   Toyota                  R/R   12/18/1991   183/92
4 Hiroto Fuku           P   JR Kyushu               L/L   06/16/1992   178/85
5 Toshiki Abe           IF  Honda                   R/R   12/03/1989   185/80
6 Ryota Ishioka         IF  JR Higashinihon         L/L   05/25/1992   187/90

i1 Seiya Nakagawa       P   Aichi Univ              L/L   12/03/1993   178/81
i2 Shu Yoshida          P   Tokushima Indigo Socks  R/R   07/08/1996   185/83
i3 Takuya Mitsuma       P   Musashi Heat Bears      R/R   07/22/1992   183/92
i4 Mikihiro Nishihama   P   Seijo Univ              R/R   08/04/1993   174/78
i5 Kaito Goya           P   Hachinohe Kosei HS      L/L   09/30/1997   180/75
i6 Masaru Watanabe      OF  Tokai Univ              R/L   10/14/1993   172/80

Carp
1 Akitake Okada         P   Osaka Shogyo Univ       R/L   10/18/1993   184/80
2 Hiroki Yokoyama       P   NTT Higashinihon        R/L   03/12/1992   187/85
3 Mikiya Takahashi      P   Hanamaki Higashi HS     L/L   06/21/1997   176/74
4 Ryota Funakoshi       C   Oji                     R/R   11/26/1993   177/79
5 Ryoma Nishikawa       IF  Oji                     R/L   12/10/1994   176/67
6 Oscar Nakaoshi        P   Honda                   L/L   03/28/1991   178/78
7 Riku Aoki             IF  Yamagata Chuo HS        R/R   11/11/1997   180/84

Tigers
1 Shun Takayama         OF  Meiji Univ              R/L   04/18/1993   181/84
2 Seishiro Sakamoto     C   Meiji Univ              R/R   11/10/1993   175/77
3 Taichi Takeyasu       P   Kumamoto Golden Larks   R/S   09/27/1994   183/70
4 Atsushi Mochizuki     P   Yokohama Sogakukan HS   R/R   08/02/1997   187/82
5 Kohyo Aoyagi          P   Teikyo Univ             R/R   12/11/1993   181/79
6 Yutaro Itayama        OF  Asia Univ               R/L   03/27/1994   180/76

Giants
1 Toshiki Sakurai       P   Ritsumeikan Univ        R/R   10/21/1993   181/73
2 Shinnosuke Shigenobu  OF  Waseda Univ             R/L   04/17/1993   173/67
3 Hirotaka Yonahara     P   Futenma HS              R/R   03/09/1998   190/88
4 Shingo Usami          C   Josai Kokusai Univ      R/L   06/04/1993   181/86
5 Yasuhiro Yamamoto     IF  Keio Univ               R/R   10/10/1993   175/75
6 Daisuke Tatsumi       P   Iwakura HS              L/L   04/26/1997   183/79
7 Kota Nakagawa         P   Tokai Univ              L/L   02/24/1994   182/81
8 Takuya Matsuzaki      IF  Nihon Seishi Ishinomaki R/R   01/20/1992   175/90

i1 Daiki Masuda         IF  Tokushima Indigo Socks  R/R   07/29/1993   172/65
i2 Daisei Kobayashi     C   Musashi Heat Bears      R/L   01/15/1994   180/82
i3 Yusuke Matsuzawa     OF  Kagawa Olive Guyners    L/L   07/01/1992   181/83
i4 Kosei Tajima         IF  Musashi Heat Bears      R/L   07/13/1996   175/78
i5 Hideyoshi Ohtake     P   Musashi Heat Bears      R/R   07/26/1988   180/87
i6 Atsuro Yamashita     P   Chinzei HS              L/L   02/24/1998   178/82
i7 Yohei Yajima         P   Musashi Heat Bears      R/R   06/16/1990   179/82
i8 Jun Hasegawa         P   Ishikawa Million Stars  R/R   06/15/1991   186/74

Swallows
x 1 Shun Takayama
1 Juri Hara             P   Toyo Univ               R/R   07/19/1993   178/70
2 Taishi Hirooka        IF  Chiben Gakuen HS        R/R   04/09/1997   181/76
3 Keiji Takahashi       P   Ryukyudai Heian HS      L/L   05/14/1997   178/71
4 Julius Higuma         P   Kochi Chuo HS           L/L   11/21/1997   184/74
5 Kotaro Yamasaki       OF  Nihon Univ              L/L   08/11/1993   173/67
6 Taiki Watanabe        IF  Senshudai Matsudo HS    R/R   06/07/1997   181/79

1am: and the feed is live! (Thanks Dani for the link!)
1:02am: watching all the old dudes in their suits filing in (whoa Nashida! Ramichan! Tanishige!)
1:05am: big cheer for new manager Kanemoto (Tigers) coming in, probably biggest yet.
1:06am: another huge cheer for Kimiyasu Kudoh (Hawks)

1:08am: Long explanation of the rules. If you don't know: first round is crazy free-for-all with ties broken by a lottery, then they go in waiver order and reverse waiver order for the next rounds (hence the actual order I have below). They're giving counts for all the student players eligible in the draft (it's about 160; there were 78 high school and 81 university letters submitted).

And a speech from the commissioner and a commercial break and THEN we will get the first round underway!

1:15am: The Eagles name Hirasawa and we're off!

First-round "picks":
Rakuten Eagles: Taiga Hirasawa, IF, Sendai Ikuei HS
Yokohama DeNA Baystars: Shota Imanaga, LHP, Komazawa Univ
Orix Buffaloes: Masataka Yoshida, OF, Aoyama Gakuin Univ
Chunichi Dragons: Junpei Takahashi, RHP, Ken Gifu Sho HS
Seibu Lions: Shinsaburo Tawata, RHP, Fuji Univ
Hiroshima Carp: Akitake Okada, RHP, Osaka Shogyo Univ
Chiba Lotte Marines: Taiga Hirasawa
Hanshin Tigers: Shun Takayama, OF, Meiji Univ
Nippon Ham Fighters: Junpei Takahashi
Yomiuri Giants: Toshiki Sakurai, P, Ritsumeikan Univ
Softbank Hawks: Junpei Takahashi
Yakult Swallows: Shun Takayama


Okay, looks like it'll be three lotteries: Eagles/Marines for Hirasawa, Tigers/Swallows for Takayama, Dragons/Fighters/Hawks for Takahashi...

Hirasawa goes to... Lotte
Takahashi goes to... Hawks (wow Kudoh looks overjoyed)
Takayama goes to... YAKULT!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yay I can keep seeing him hit things at Jingu :)

Okay, going to work on the results grid now while they work out the next part of the first round.

BTW, can I mention that I'm super happy the Giants took someone I completely don't care about?

So the Eagles, Dragons, Tigers, and Fighters need to name new players since they lost lotteries...

1:32 WAIT what the hell is going on? Kanemoto wants to confirm that Hanshin actually won the Takayama lottery?!?!?!? oh no WAY. Hanshin you already have Hayata Itoh you don't need another one WTF.

I guess that means the SWALLOWS now need to name a new player and I need to be grumpy.

I feel like Kanemoto is getting an early start on learning how to challenge things as a manager. Jason points out that he's already winning at it :P

NEXT DAY EDIT for clarification: It seems, according to Kozo and to Sanspo, that what actually went down was this:

• Kanemoto and Manaka took their ballots
• Manaka opened his and having never seen one before, and seeing a stamp on it at all instead of a blank page, did a "guts pose" because he thought he had won
• In reality, Kanemoto's slip had the "交渉権獲得" on it, but he didn't even look at it after seeing Manaka go crazy
• When the NPB staffer came by to their tables to take their ballot slips back and confirm, they informed Kanemoto that HE infact had the slip saying he won the lottery
• Then Kanemoto got up and did an interview about how happy he was to get Takayama while the rest of us were like "WTF"

Poor Manaka.  I guess he has some more important things on his mind like beating down the Hawks in the Japan Series tomorrow.

First Round, Take 2:
Eagles: Rui Okoe, OF, Kanto Daiichi HS
Dragons: Shinnosuke Ogasawara, LHP, Tokaidai Sagami HS
Fighters: Shinnosuke Ogasawara
Swallows: Juri Hara, RHP, Toyo University

And of course the DRAGONS get Ogasawara which means I don't get to reuse my old Fighters Ogasawara jersey as I was vaguely hoping for a few seconds there.

1:50am: Well, now the Fighters get to choose a first-round pick and then we go in waiver order. Bleh.

First Round, Take 3:
Fighters: Kenta Uehara, P, Meiji University

I had a feeling that would happen. Why couldn't we have gotten Sachiya that way instead if we wanted a big lefty from Meiji? Unlucky year.

Okay, they're taking a break for a bit and the TV will probably cut out.

First round thoughts:

No guys were taken from the industrial leagues (or indie but that would be really weird).

It was awfully university-heavy: 8 out of 12.

While typing in info I just realized that Kenta Uehara is an even more statistical anomaly in some ways because he's so huge but he's also the youngest you can possibly be in your class (Japan starts school in April, so everyone in a year is the same age, the oldest in the class were born in April and the youngest born in March -- you often end up with a lot more athletes being born in April-May-June just because they tended to always be the biggest kids in their class).

2:10am and the draft is continuing with Rakuten taking Ryota Yoshimochi and Yokohama taking Kento Kumabara in the 2nd round (after a long interview with Rami explaining exactly why he's happy to get Imanaga). And first shakaijin guy is Taisuke Kondoh from Panasonic, going to Orix.

BTW, for the most part from now on I'm just going to go look up guys and fill in the table except for commentary when guys I care about get drafted.

I had joked that Yokohama had to take Funamoto or Azegami in the second round to continue their streak of taking my Hosei boys and running them into the ground but we'll have to see what actually happens there :)

2:18 nevermind here is the part where I go off about Ryota Sekiya going to Lotte and Seishiro Sakamoto going to Hanshin, I guess. Sekiya was a year ahead of Sachiya at Nichidai Sanko AND at Meiji and he's also a good pitcher. And then Seishiro Sakamoto -- Meiji captain this year, great guy, great catcher. He's from Kansai -- infact he was a year or two behind Tetsuto Yamada at Riseisha HS -- so I guess it's ok for him to go to Hanshin -- but I'm really worried he'll get stuck behind Umeno :(

2:19 OMG THE FIGHTERS TAKE TAKAYUKI KATOH IN THE SECOND ROUND!!!

Super excited about this one. He's a big tall pile of arms and legs but I've seen him pitch and he's good. Watched him throw a shutout against ENEOS last year -- I was there to cheer ENEOS but came out of it impressed by Katoh and even got a photo with him -- infact I've been slacking off on posting names because I went to dig up that photo :) (see photo tweet here)

2:33 excited that Takuya Kinoshita finally got drafted -- I remember him filling out a form for it back in 2013 but he didn't get picked then

2:37 Koji Ohshiro! To Orix! Now I guess that means my friend K is going to go watch a LOT of Orix games to see Sachiya AND Koji :)

2:50 in passing I wanted to note that Yakult took Julius Higuma that I'd mentioned earlier (yay!) and Kotaro Yamasaki from Nichidai (yay!)

3:27 I was just slogging away translating names into the table when suddenly i heard the FIGHTERS TAKE TOSHITAKE YOKOO FROM KEIO/SANKO/WHATEVER OMG! One of my Sanko boys is going to be a Fighter! holy CRAP!

5:43am: Hi! I've translated the main rounds but haven't gotten to the ikusei draft yet. It's basically summarized by saying "The Giants drafted a bunch of BCL guys and a few other semi-interesting names popped up". I'll do it sometime tomorrow.

Man, this was a pretty insane draft after all. Still feeling pretty awful about Takayama and on the Fighters missing both their lotteries but whatever. I think it'll all work out in the end. Now my goal for Arizona next year is clearly to get a photo between Arihara and Uehara since they're both so huge.

Next day 5:50pm: I'm done entering all the ikusei!

BTW, I still stand by my assertion that there are always going to be more athletes born near the start of the school year, and this draft class doesn't contradict that at all:

Time of Year      Players Born
------------      ------------
April - Jun         38 (33%)
Jul - Sep           25 (22%)
Oct - Dec           35 (30%)
Jan - Mar           18 (16%)