Sho Nakata

Nakata with the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters

Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters – No. 6

First baseman, Outfielder

Born: April 22, 1989
Hiroshima, Hiroshima, Japan

Bats: Right

Throws: Right

NPB debut

May 23, 2009, for the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters

NPB statistics
(through 2015)

.259

136

466

.777

Teams

Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters (2009–present)

Career highlights and awards

1× Leader of RBI in Pacific League (2014)
2× Pacific League Best Nine Award (2013-2014)

Medal record

Men's baseball
Representing Japan
2015 WBSC Premier12
	2015 Tokyo	Team

Sho Nakata (中田翔, Nakata Shō, born April 22, 1989 in Hiroshima) is a Japanese professional baseball player playing for the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters. He plays outfield and first base.

Early Baseball Career

As a high school student, he played as a pitcher for Osaka Toin High School and his fastball was clocked at 94 mph.^[1] In 2006, he took part in a National High School Baseball Championship, but he was defeated by his opponent Yuki Saito in his second game.

Nakata was a highly hyped prospect out of high school, hitting a total of 87 home runs, a Japanese record. On November 3, 2006, during a prefectural tournament game, the 17-year-old cracked a 550' homer out of the park then over a couple houses before landing across the street. That shattered the old record for the park, 425' by future NPB regular Osamu Hamanaka. The Minnesota Twins, New York Mets and Seattle Mariners all expressed interest, with Seattle offering $2.5 million. Nakata turned all of them down to play in Nippon Pro Baseball.

Nippon-Ham Fighters

He was in the first pick by Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters in the 2007 draft (High School Players). He succeeds the number 6, previously belongs to "Mr. Fighters" Yukio Tanaka.^[2]

He struggled in his first spring training in 2008, and was sent down to ni-gun for seasoning. He fared well, hitting .255/.339/.464 with 11 HR in 196 AB. He was five homers behind Eastern League leader Yohei Kaneko despite missing the last two months after knee surgery.

Nakata starred in the minors in 2009, tying the Eastern League RBI record (95, previously set by Corey Paul) and setting a new homer record (30, also held by Paul). He made it into 22 official games, debuting on May 23 and singling off Ricky Barrett in his first at-bat in Nippon Pro Baseball. He was 10 for 36 with two doubles, three runs, one RBI, one walk and 15 whiffs for Nippon Ham.

Nakata was moved to the outfield in 2010, but once again missed two months due to knee surgery. He hit .233/.291/.395 with 9 HR but 61 strikeouts in 210 at-bats. His first NPB homer came off Yuta Omine on July 20. He got six votes for the 2010 Pacific League Rookie of the Year Award, well back of Ryo Sakakibara's 87. He also trailed Keisuke Katto, Masahiko Morifuku and Takashi Ogino.

As a regular in 2011, Nakata hit .237/.283/.408 with 32 doubles, 18 home runs and 91 RBI. In a low-offense season, he ranked among the Pacific League leaders in many departments. He was third in RBI (behind Takeya Nakamura and Hiroyuki Nakajima), second in doubles (to Kazuo Matsui), tied for third in homers (with Aarom Baldiris, trailing Nakamura by 30 and Nobuhiro Matsuda by 7), tied for 5th in total bases (215, even with Mitsutaka Gotoh), second in sacrifice flies (8, behind Nakajima), third in strikeouts (133, one behind co-leaders Chung-Shou Yang and Nakamura), tied for 6th in double play grounders (12, even with Baldiris) and 9th in slugging (between Goto and Atsunori Inaba).

He is the first Fighters player to hit at least 20 homers over three consecutive seasons since Michihiro Ogasawara (now the 2nd team coach of the Chunichi Dragons).^[3] Together with rookie pitcher Shohei Ohtani, the duo are dubbed as the "O-N tandem of the Heisei Era", referencing to the Sadaharu Oh and Shigeo Nagashima's "O-N cannon" back in their prime with the Yomiuri Giants

In 2013, he played for Japanese national baseball team in 2013 WBC.

Nakata was named the most valuable player of the 2016 Pacific League Climax Series.^[4]

References

↑ White, Paul (March 30, 2007). "Japan frets over talent exodus to North America". USA Today. Retrieved November 12, 2010.
↑ "Power-hitting phenom Nakata thrust into spotlight". The Japan Times. 2008-02-21. Retrieved 2009-01-27.
↑ "Sho Nakata Starts Slugging for Ham Fighters". One World Sports. 2013-08-05. Retrieved 2013-08-05.
↑ "Never-say-die attitude takes Fighters to Japan Series". The Japan Times. October 16, 2016. Retrieved October 19, 2016.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sho Nakata.

Nippon Professional Baseball career statistics from JapaneseBaseball.com
NPB stats

Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters current roster

Active roster	1 Dai-Kang Yang 2 Kenshi Sugiya 3 Kensuke Tanaka 4 Yuji Iiyama 5 Brandon Laird 6 Sho Nakata 7 Haruki Nishikawa 8 Kensuke Kondo 9 Takuya Nakashima 10 Yushi Shimizu 11 Shohei Otani 12 Go Matsumoto 13 Yuya Ishii 14 Takayuki Kato 15 Luis Mendoza 16 Kohei Arihara 17 Hiroshi Urano 18 Yuki Saito 19 Hirotoshi Masui 20 Kenta Uehara 21 Hisashi Takeda 23 Ryo Watanabe 25 Naoki Miyanishi 26 Daiki Asama 27 Shota Ohno 28 Hayato Arakaki 29 Kazutomo Iguchi 30 Yohei Kagiya 31 Hiromi Oka 32 Susumu Orui 33 Hideki Sunaga 34 Mitsuo Yoshikawa 35 Yodai Enoshita 36 Masaru Nakamura 37 Kenji Yano 38 Masaru Takeda 39 Hirotoshi Takanashi 40 Masashi Kanehira 43 Akihiro Hakumura 45 Shota Hiranuma 46 Hayao Segawa 47 Toyoki Tanaka 48 Keisuke Tanimoto 49 Shingo Ishikawa 50 Ruita Usami 51 Naoya Ishikawa 52 Anthony Bass 53 Shota Tatsuta 54 Yutaka Otsuka 55 Chris Martin 56 Tomoya Ichikawa 57 Shogo Yagi 58 Toshitake Yokoo 59 Yuki Yoshida 60 Yuji Arabari 61 Yuya Himeno 62 Yuto Takahama 63 Naoyuki Uwasawa 64 Yuya Taniguchi 65 Kengo Ota 66 Takumi Oshima 67 Ryosuke Kishizato 68 Ryo Ishikawa 70 Tomohito Yoneno

Coaching staff	Manager 80 Hideki Kuriyama

Japan 2013 World Baseball Classic roster

1 Takashi Toritani 2 Ryoji Aikawa 3 Hirokazu Ibata 5 Nobuhiro Matsuda 6 Hayato Sakamoto 7 Kazuo Matsui 9 Yoshio Itoi 10 Shinnosuke Abe 11 Hideaki Wakui 13 Sho Nakata 14 Atsushi Nohmi 15 Hirokazu Sawamura 16 Takeru Imamura 17 Masahiro Tanaka 18 Toshiya Sugiuchi 20 Kenta Maeda 21 Masahiko Morifuku 24 Seiichi Uchikawa 26 Tetsuya Utsumi 27 Ginjiro Sumitani 28 Kenji Otonari 34 Hisayoshi Chōno 35 Kazuhisa Makita 41 Atsunori Inaba 46 Yuichi Honda 47 Tetsuya Yamaguchi 50 Tadashi Settsu 61 Katsuya Kakunaka

Manager Koji Yamamoto Coach Osamu Higashio Coach Masataka Nashida Coach Koichi Ogata Coach Nobuhiro Takashiro Coach Kazuyoshi Tatsunami Coach Tsuyoshi Yoda

Japan roster – 2015 WBSC Premier12

3 Nobuhiro Matsuda 5 Shingo Kawabata 6 Hayato Sakamoto 7 Akira Nakamura 8 Ryosuke Hirata 9 Takuya Nakashima 10 Yuki Matsui 11 Tomoyuki Sugano 13 Sho Nakata 14 Takahiro Norimoto 15 Hirokazu Sawamura 16 Shohei Otani 18 Kenta Maeda 19 Hirotoshi Masui 21 Yuki Nishi 22 Yudai Ono 23 Tetsuto Yamada 24 Yasuaki Yamasaki 25 Yoshitomo Tsutsugo 27 Ginjiro Sumitani 29 Yasuhiro Ogawa 30 Shota Takeda 35 Kazuhisa Makita 37 Motohiro Shima 52 Yuhei Nakamura 55 Shogo Akiyama 60 Takeya Nakamura

Manager 90 Hiroki Kokubo

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