Meikyukai

The Meikyukai (日本プロ野球名球会, Nippon Puro Yakyū Meikyūkai, The Golden Players Club) is one of the two baseball halls of fame in Japan (the other is; Yakyu Dendo 野球殿堂). The Meikyukai is a company ltd. for public benefit.

Founded by Hall of Fame pitcher Masaichi Kaneda in 1978, the Meikyukai honors players born during the Shōwa period (1926–1988). Players are automatically inducted if they reach career totals of 2,000 hits, 200 wins, or 250 saves (added in December 2003) in the Japanese professional leagues.

Inductees are awarded a special jacket, and participate in various baseball-related events during the off-season. Meikyukai members mostly makes appearances in charity and volunteer events, and holds annual meetings and a golf tournament, which is often broadcast on television. All of the money raised from the golf tournament is donated to the Red Cross.

History

Kaneda founded Meikyukai on July 24, 1978. In addition to Kaneda, the founding members of the club were Kazuhisa Inao, Masaaki Koyama, Keishi Suzuki, Tetsuya Yoneda, Shinichi Etoh, Sadaharu Oh, Morimichi Takagi, Masahiro Doi, Shigeo Nagashima, Katsuya Nomura, Isao Harimoto, Yoshinori Hirose, Kazuhiro Yamauchi, Takao Kajimoto, Mutsuo Minagawa and Minoru Murayama.

Hiromitsu Ochiai reached 2,000 hits in 1995, but declined membership because Kaneda and other members had repeatedly criticized him during his career.[1]

First baseman Kihachi Enomoto (with 2,314 career hits) didn't decline membership, but never participated in any of the club's meetings or events, and was not recognized as a member. (He died in 2012.)[2]

In 2008, founder Masaichi Kaneda passed on club leadership to home run champion Sadaharu Oh after running it for more than 30 years.

The most recent inductee is Takashi Toritani, who got his 2000th career hit on 8 September 2017.

Qualifications for inclusion

The founding members of the club limited membership to players born after 1926, partly because they only wanted members that had begun their career after the two-league system of Japanese baseball was established in 1950 (when the Japanese Baseball League reorganized into Nippon Professional Baseball), but mostly because Kaneda did not want to include qualified members, such as Tetsuharu Kawakami, that were older than he was. According to current regulations, only players born between 1926 and 1988 can join, but the rules will probably be changed for younger players to be inducted in the near future.

Records in Major League Baseball (MLB) are also valid in counting the numbers; However, Meikyukai only takes records from the point where the player started his NPB career (i.e.: records before debut in NPB don't count).[3] For example, Alex Ramírez's 86 hits in MLB before his NPB career were excluded[4] and he was not inducted until he recorded his 2,000th NPB hit on April 6, 2013.[5]

Though other records such as home runs, stolen bases, and strikeouts are not officially included in the qualifications, Yutaka Fukumoto was specially inducted when he reached 800 career stolen bases (he would later mark 2,000 career hits).

Nationality is not officially regarded as a qualification, but since MLB records before starting a NPB career do not count, only one non-Japanese player (Alex Ramírez) so far has met the milestone.

Members
  • Active players are indicated with an asterisk (*).
  • Deceased players are indicated in plain italics.
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See also

References
  1. "名球会目指してきたわけじゃない　落合博満、資格獲得も入会辞退(I wasn't necessarily aiming of the Meikyukai. Hiromitsu Ochiai on receiving recognition and refusing it)" (in Japanese). Sponichi. April 2009. Archived from the original on 15 March 2016. Retrieved 10 June 2016.
  2. "Kihachi Enomoto," Baseball-Reference Bullpen. Accessed April 6, 2015.
  3. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2013-10-17. Retrieved 2013-05-06.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  4. Lefton, Brad (July 7, 2012). "Where No Westerner in Japan Has Gone". The New York Times. Archived from the original on July 9, 2012.
  5. Coskrey, Jason (April 9, 2013). "Ramirez possibly top foreign-born player ever in NPB". The Japan Times. Archived from the original on April 12, 2013.
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