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The Hanshin Tigers are one of the oldest professional clubs in Japan. They played their first season in 1936 as the Osaka Tigers and assumed their current team name in 1961.
History
Kōshien Stadium in 2009
The Hanshin Tigers, the second-oldest professional club in Japan, were founded on December 10, 1935, with the team being formed in 1936.[1] The team was first called Ōsaka Tigers. In 1940, amid anti-foreign sentiment and the Tojo government's ban on English nicknames, the Tigers changed the name to simply Hanshin. In 1947, the team reverted to Ōsaka Tigers after the JPBL mandated English nicknames. The current team name was assumed in 1961 due to the team playing in the suburb of Nishinomiya, which is not in Osaka Prefecture.
The Tigers won four titles before the establishment of the two-league system in 1950. Since the league was split into the Central League and Pacific League, the Tigers have won the Central League pennant six times (1962, 1964, 1985, 2003, 2005, 2023) and Japan Series twice (1985, 2023).
In 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2009, more than three million people attended games hosted by the Tigers, the only one of the 12 Nippon Professional Baseball teams to achieve this.
The home field, Koshien Stadium, is used by high school baseball teams from all over Japan for the national championship tournaments in spring and summer. The summer tournament takes place in the middle of the Tigers' season, forcing the Tigers to go on a road trip and play their home games at Kyocera Dome Osaka. Fans call this "The Road of Death".
The home field of the Tigers, Hanshin Koshien Stadium, is one of three major natural grass baseball stadiums in Japan. The others are the Mazda Zoom-Zoom Stadium Hiroshima (Hiroshima Toyo Carp), and Hotto Motto Field Kobe (part-time home of the Orix Buffaloes). Of the three, only Koshien has an all-dirt infield (the other two have an American-style infield). There are numerous smaller grass field ballparks around the country; Japanese baseball teams frequently play games in small cities.[citation needed]
Koshien Stadium is the oldest ballpark in Japan; built in 1924, the stadium was once visited by American baseball legend Babe Ruth on a tour of Major League stars in 1934.[3] There is a monument commemorating this visit within the stadium grounds, in an area called Mizuno Square.
Koshien is revered as a "sacred" ballpark, and players traditionally bow before entering and before leaving its hallowed field. The stadium hosts the annual Japanese High School Baseball Championship in the summer and Japanese High School Baseball Invitational Tournament in the spring. The losing team in any high school baseball game played at the ballpark is allowed to scoop up handfuls of Koshien infield dirt, stuffing holy soil into their cleat bags as hordes of Japanese media snap photos at arm's length.
As with many other underachieving baseball teams, a curse is believed to lurk over the Tigers.[4] In 1985 the Tigers had just clinched the Central League pennant, fans celebrated by having people who looked like Tigers players jump into the Dōtonbori Canal. According to legend, because none of the fans resembled first basemanRandy Bass, fans grabbed a life-sized statue of the KFC mascot, Colonel Sanders, and threw it into the river (like Bass, the Colonel had a beard and was not Japanese). After this the Tigers managed to defeat the Seibu Lions in the 1985 Japan Series four games to three. After many seasons after the incident without a pennant win, the Tigers were said to be doomed never to win the season again until the Colonel was rescued from the river.
In 2003, when the Tigers returned to the Japan Series after 18 years with the best record in the Central League, many KFC outlets in Kōbe and Ōsaka moved their Colonel Sanders statues inside until the series was over to protect themselves from Tigers fans.
In 2005, like 2003, they clinched the pennant and made it back to the Japan Series, but lost to Bobby Valentine's Chiba Lotte Marines. They were outscored 35–6 in four games.
The top half of the statue (excluding both hands) was finally recovered on March 10, 2009, and the bottom half and right hand shortly after, in the canal by construction workers while constructing a new boardwalk area as part of a beautification project. The statue is still missing its left hand and glasses. The KFC outlet where this statue once stood has since closed; the statue is now at the KFC headquarters in Yokohama. It is not viewable by the public. Since then, the Hanshin Tigers made the 2014 Japan Series, but lost to the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks in 5 games. The curse was finally broken, after the Hanshin Tigers managed to defeat the rival Orix Buffaloes in the 2023 Japan Series four games to three.
Fandom
Tigers fans at a home game at Koshien StadiumTigers fans release balloons at the Kyocera Dome, the home stadium of the Orix Buffaloes
Tigers fans are known as perhaps the most fanatical and dedicated fans in all of Japanese professional baseball. They often outnumber the home team fans at Tigers "away" games. Tigers fans also once had a reputation for rough behavior and a willingness to brawl with other fans or with each other, although fights are rare these days.[5]
A famous Tigers fan tradition (done by other teams of NPB as well) is the release, by the fans, of hundreds of air-filled balloons immediately following the seventh-inning stretch and the singing of the Tigers' fight song. This tradition is carried out at all home and away games, except at games against the Yomiuri Giants in the Tokyo Dome due to the Giants' notoriously authoritarian and heavy-handed rules for controlling behavior by visiting fans.
The Tigers-Giants rivalry is considered the national Japanese rivalry, on par with the Dodgers–Giants rivalry and Yankees–Red Sox rivalry in Major League Baseball or El Clásico in Spanish football. The two teams have historically had a relatively close record of games with the Giants taking 1127 wins over the Tigers whereas the Tigers have taken 888 games over the Giants. 77 of the total games between the two have ended in tie.[6]
Fight song
"The Hanshin Tigers' Song (阪神タイガースの歌, Hanshin Tigers no Uta)", as known as "Rokko Oroshi (六甲颪, 六甲おろし, lit. The (Downward) Wind of Mount Rokko)", lyrics by Sonosuke Sato (佐藤 惣之助) and composed by Yuji Koseki (古関 裕而), is a popular song in the Kansai area. It is the official fight song of the Tigers. In Japan, wind which blows down from a mountain is known to be cold and harsh, hence the song symbolizes the Tiger's brave challenge under hardship. The song can be found on karaoke boxes.
Rokkō oroshi ni sassō to
Sōten kakeru nichirin no
Seishun no haki uruwashiku
Kagayaku wagana zo Hanshin Tigers
Ō-ō-ō-ō Hanshin Tigers
Fure-fure-fure-fure
Tōshi hatsuratsu tatsu ya ima
Nekketsu sude ni teki o tsuku
Jūō no iki takaraka ni
Muteki no warera zo Hanshin Tigers
Ō-ō-ō-ō Hanshin Tigers
Fure-fure-fure-fure
Tetsuwan kyōda ikuchitabi
Kitaete koko ni Kōshien
Shōri ni moyuru eikan wa
Kagayaku warera zo Hanshin Tigers
Ō-ō-ō-ō Hanshin Tigers
Fure-fure-fure-fure
an official English version, not a direct translation
Dashing swiftly through the wind blowin' from Rokko
Like the big sun soaring in the clear blue sky
Mighty spirit of the youth shows the victor's grace
The name that shines in glory "Hanshin Tigers"
Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Hanshin Tigers
Go, Go, Go, Go!
Powerful hits and skillful pitch achieved a thousand times
Trained with every discipline here at Koshien
Crowned with constant victory glorious, matchless feat
Always proud, invincible "Hanshin Tigers"
Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Hanshin Tigers
Go, Go, Go, Go!
NOTE: The 1944 Japanese Baseball League season was cut-short, the 1945 season was cancelled due to the ongoing war (World War II) with many players being enlisted to fight, and the 2020 Nippon Professional Baseball season was cut short due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
To Lucky (トラッキー, Torakkii) is a mascot character of the Tigers. With his girlfriend Lucky, he entertains spectators at team games. His uniform number is 1985, because his first appearance was in 1985. His name is a combination of two separate Japanese words, Tora (トラ), meaning tiger and Rakkii (ラッキー) meaning lucky. His name therefore means "lucky tiger" in Japanese.
To Lucky's first appearance was on the screen at Hanshin Koshien Stadium in 1985. He appeared as a live-action character in 1987. His design was updated in 1992.
Aside from To Lucky, the other mascots of the Tigers are Lucky (ラッキーRakkii), his girlfriend, and the most recent addition, Keeta (キー太), Lucky's little brother. Keeta's uniform number is 2011, because he was introduced to the Tigers in 2011. He wears a backwards cap. Lucky's cap is pink unlike her boyfriend's and his little brother's.
^Kelly, William W. (2004). "Sense and Sensibility at the Ballpark: What Fans Make of Professional Baseball in Modern Japan". In Kelly, William W. (ed.). Fanning the Flames: Fans and Consumer Culture in Contemporary Japan. State University of New York Press. pp. 79–106. ISBN9780791485385.
