- Hiromitsu Ochiai
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Hiromitsu Ochiai
落合 博満Retirement — No. 66 Manager Born: December 9, 1953
Wakami, Akita, JapanBatted: Right Threw: Right Professional debut NPB: May 29, 1979 for the Lotte Orions Last professional appearance October 7, 1998 for the Nippon Ham Fighters NPB statistics Batting average .311 Hits 2371 RBIs 1564 Teams As player - Lotte Orions (1979 - 1986)
- Chunichi Dragons (1987 - 1993)
- Yomiuri Giants (1994 - 1996)
- Nippon Ham Fighters (1997 - 1998)
As manager
- Chunichi Dragons (2004 - 2011)
Career highlights and awards - 2× Pacific League MVP (1982, 1985)
Hiromitsu Ochiai (落合 博満 Ochiai Hiromitsu, born December 9, 1953) is a former Japanese professional baseball player. He is currently manager of the Chunichi Dragons in Japan's Nippon Professional Baseball. He is considered to be one of the most important people in the history of Japanese baseball, winning numerous batting awards and being the only player to receive the prestigious triple crown batting award three times.
Contents
Biography
Ochiai was born in the town of Wakami in Akita, Japan, a rice-farming area of northern Honshū. Ochiai was the youngest of five children and grew up enjoying spending time in the cinema rather than on the baseball field. At Toyo University, he quit after one year as he did not approve of the traditional way freshman players had to cater to the senior players on the team. He joined Toshiba Fuchu, a team in the Japanese industrial league, after leaving Toyo University.
In 1978, at 25 years old, the third baseman joined Lotte Orions after being selected in the third round of the draft. The Lotte manager did not care for his unorthodox right-handed batting style and Masaichi Kaneda criticized Ochiai, but Isao Harimoto supported Ochiai and Ochiai did not quit.[1] From 1981, Ochiai played a regular role for his team, and in 1982 he won his first triple crown batting title. He also won the Triple crown in 1985 and 1986, and continued winning titles through 1991.
In 1987, Ochiai was traded to the Chunichi Dragons by the Lotte Orions. During the 1994 season, the Yomiuri Giants picked up Ochiai as a free agent. After the Giants signed Kazuhiro Kiyohara in 1997, Ochiai joined the Nippon Ham Fighters at the age of 43. At the conclusion of the 1998 sesason, Ochiai retired.
Ochiai's style is called Oreryu(オレ流). Oreryu means "to do with only my style." The word described how he acted according to his personal philosophies.
Hiromitsu Ochiai has been the manager of the Chunichi Dragons since 2004. He led the Dragons to the Japan Series during his inaugural year as manager in 2004, again in 2006, and led them to victory on the third try in 2007. He was inducted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame in 2011.
Awards and Accomplishments
- MVP (1982, 1985)
- Triple Crown (1982, 1985, 1986)
- Batting Title (1981~1983, 1985, 1986)
- Home run Title (1982, 1985, 1986, 1990, 1991)
- Run batted in Title (1982, 1985, 1986, 1989, 1990)
- On-base percentage Title (1982, 1985~1988, 1990, 1991)
- Best Nine Award (1981~1986, 1988~1991)
- Matsutaro Shoriki Award (2007)
Career batting statistics
YEAR Team Number G PA AB R H 2B 3B HR TB RBI SB CS SB SF BB HBP K DP ERR AVG OBP SLG OPS 1979 Lotte
Orions6 36 69 64 7 15 3 1 2 26 7 1 0 0 0 4 1 12 2 1 .234 .290 .406 .696 1980 57 188 166 28 47 7 0 15 99 32 1 0 2 2 17 1 23 5 5 .283 .349 .596 .946 1981 127 502 423 69 138 19 3 33 262 90 6 3 1 4 68 6 55 17 9 .326 .423 .619 1.043 1982 128 552 462 86 150 32 1 32 280 99 8 2 0 4 81 5 58 11 7 .325 .428 .606 1.034 1983 119 497 428 79 142 22 1 25 241 75 6 5 0 3 64 2 52 14 7 .332 .419 .563 .982 1984 129 562 456 89 143 17 3 33 265 94 8 1 0 4 98 4 33 14 16 .314 .436 .581 1.017 1985 130 568 460 118 169 21 1 52 351 146 5 1 0 4 101 3 40 16 19 .367 .481 .763 1.244 1986 123 522 417 98 150 11 0 50 311 116 5 1 0 1 101 3 59 15 10 .360 .487 .746 1.232 1987 Chunichi
Dragons125 519 432 83 143 33 0 28 260 85 1 4 0 4 81 2 51 10 9 .331 .435 .602 1.037 1988 130 557 450 82 132 31 1 32 261 95 3 4 0 6 98 3 70 11 10 .293 .418 .580 .998 1989 130 559 476 78 153 23 1 40 298 116 4 3 1 6 75 1 69 11 6 .321 .410 .626 1.036 1990 131 570 458 93 133 19 1 34 256 102 3 3 0 8 100 4 87 7 7 .290 .416 .559 .975 1991 112 478 374 80 127 17 0 37 255 91 4 2 0 5 95 4 55 9 5 .340 .473 .682 1.155 1992 116 481 384 58 112 22 1 22 202 71 2 3 0 6 88 3 74 12 3 .292 .425 .526 .948 1993 119 504 396 64 113 19 0 17 183 65 1 2 0 8 96 4 69 13 4 .285 .423 .462 .885 1994 Yomiuri
Giants60 129 540 447 53 125 19 0 15 189 68 0 0 0 6 81 6 56 13 8 .280 .393 .423 .815 1995 6 117 483 399 64 124 15 1 17 192 65 1 0 0 8 73 3 87 17 5 .311 .414 .481 .895 1996 106 448 376 60 113 18 0 21 194 86 3 0 0 2 67 3 53 11 6 .301 .408 .516 .924 1997 Nippon Ham
Fighters3 113 466 397 35 104 14 0 3 127 43 3 0 0 5 61 3 60 16 3 .262 .361 .320 .680 1998 59 192 162 11 38 6 0 2 50 18 0 1 0 2 26 2 22 12 0 .235 .344 .309 .652 Total 2236 9257 7627 1335 2371 371 15 510 4302 1564 65 35 4 88 1475 63 1135 236 140 .311 .422 .564 .987 References
External links
- Nippon Professional Baseball career statistics from Japanesebaseball.com
Awards Preceded by
Yutaka Enatsu
Greg WellsPacific League MVP
1982
1985Succeeded by
Osamu Higashio
Hiromichi IshigePreceded by
Koichi Nakano
Randy BassJapan Professional Sports Grand Prize
1982
1986Succeeded by
Tatsuro Hirooka
Ayako OkamotoPacific League MVP Award 1950: Betto | 1951: Yamamoto | 1952: Yuki | 1953: Okamoto | 1954: Oshita | 1955: Iida | 1956: Nakanishi | 1957: Inao | 1958: Inao | 1959: Sugiura | 1960: Yamauchi | 1961: Nomura | 1962: Harimoto | 1963: Nomura | 1964: Stanka | 1965: Nomura | 1966: Nomura | 1967: Adachi | 1968: Yoneda | 1969: Nagaike | 1970: Kitaru | 1971: Nagaike | 1972: Fukumoto | 1973: Nomura | 1974: Kaneda | 1975: Kato | 1976: Yamada | 1977: Yamada | 1978: Yamada | 1979: Manuel | 1980: Kida | 1981: Enatsu | 1982: Ochiai | 1983: Higashio | 1984: G. Wells | 1985: Ochiai | 1986: Ishige | 1987: Higashio | 1988: Kadota | 1989: Bryant | 1990: Nomo | 1991: T. Kaku | 1992: Ishii | 1993: Kudoh | 1994: Suzuki | 1995: Suzuki | 1996: Suzuki | 1997: Nishiguchi | 1998: K. Matsui | 1999: Kudoh | 2000: Matsunaka | 2001: Rhodes | 2002: Cabrera | 2003: Johjima | 2004: Matsunaka | 2005: Sugiuchi | 2006: Ogasawara | 2007: Darvish | 2008: Iwakuma | 2009: Darvish | 2010: WadaNippon Professional Baseball managers by team Current managers highlighted Central League Pacific League Chunichi Dragons (Ochiai) Chiba Lotte Marines (Nishimura) Hanshin Tigers (Mayumi) Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks (Akiyama) Hiroshima Toyo Carp (Nomura) Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters (Nashida) Tokyo Yakult Swallows (Ogawa) Orix Buffaloes (Okada) Yokohama BayStars (Obana) Saitama Seibu Lions (Watanabe) Yomiuri Giants (Hara) Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles (Hoshino) Others: Chunichi Dragons current roster First squad 00 Akihiro Maeda | 2 Masahiro Araki | 5 Kazuhiro Wada | 6 Hirokazu Ibata | 8 Ryosuke Hirata | 9 Kei Nomoto | 13 Hitoki Iwase | 19 Kazuki Yoshimi | 20 Kenichi Nakata | 21 Wei-Yin Chen | 23 Yoshihiro Suzuki | 24 Hidenori Kuramoto | 27 Motonobu Tanishige | 30 Masahiko Morino | 34 Masahiro Yamamoto | 41 Takuya Asao | 42 Tony Blanco | 43 Takashi Ogasawara | 44 Masaaki Koike | 46 Tatsuro Iwasaki | 60 Junichi Kawahara | 65 Kenji Oyama | 67 Akifumi Takahashi | 69 Masato Kobayashi
Second squad 0 Hiroki Kongoh | 1 Naomichi Donoue | 4 Atsushi Fujii | 7 Dionys Cesar | 11 Toshiya Okada | 12 Akinobu Shimizu | 14 Kenta Asakura | 16 Ryuya Ogawa | 17 Susumu Kawai | 18 Junki Ito | 22 Daisuke Tanaka | 25 Ryota Arai | 26 Sohma Yamauchi | 28 Shinji Iwata | 29 Daisuke Yamai | 31 Hiroki Nakagawa | 32 Yohei Oshima | 33 Masafumi Hirai | 35 Shohei Takashima | 36 Tetsuya Tani | 37 Kyohei Iwasaki | 38 Shinsuke Saitoh | 39 Koji Mise | 40 Akira Nishikawa | 45 Edward Valdez | 47 Masato Matsui | 48 Michihisa Sawai | 49 Maximo Nelson | 50 Ryoji Nakata | 51 Issei Nakamura | 52 Kohei Oda | | 53 Shigeo Yanagida | 54 Kazuyuki Akasaka | 55 Nobumasa Fukuda | 56 Yusuke Matsui | 57 Toshikazu Yoshida | 59 Kento Yachi | 61 Yuichi Hisamoto | 62 Shingo Ito | 63 Takehiro Donoue | 64 Ryosuke Oguma | 68 Shoji Nagamine | 70 Mitsuru Satoh | 201 Satoshi Kato | 202 Ryuichiro Akada | 211 Takaya Kobayashi | 213 Joaquin Santamaria | 214 Candido Jesus
Coaching Staff Manager 66 Hiromitsu Ochiai | Second squad Manager 85 Hatsuhiko Tsuji
Categories:- Living people
- 1953 births
- People from Akita Prefecture
- Japanese baseball players
- Lotte Orions players
- Chunichi Dragons players
- Yomiuri Giants players
- Nippon Ham Fighters players
- Managers of baseball teams in Japan
- Nippon Professional Baseball MVP Award winners
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