List of top Nippon Professional Baseball strikeout pitchers

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The following is a list of Nippon Professional Baseball pitchers who have recorded at least 2,000 strikeouts. In baseball, a strikeout occurs when the batter receives three strikes during his time at bat. Strikeouts are associated with dominance on the part of the pitcher and failure on the part of the batter.

Contents

Masaichi Kaneda has the most career strikeouts in Nippon Professional Baseball. During a 19-year career, he struck out 4,490 batters.

The List

Denotes elected to Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame.
BoldDenotes active player.

A player is considered "inactive" if he has not played baseball for one year or has announced his retirement.
Stats updated as of the end of 2015 season. [1] [2]

RankPlayer (R/L)KYears pitched
1 Masaichi Kaneda (L) †4,4901950–1969
2 Tetsuya Yoneda (R) †3,3881956–1977
3 Masaaki Koyama (R) †3,1591953–1973
4 Keishi Suzuki (L) †3,0611966–1985
5 Yutaka Enatsu (L)2,9871967–1984
6 Takao Kajimoto (L) †2,9451954–1973
7 Kimiyasu Kudoh (L) †2,8521981–2010
8 Kazuhisa Inao (R) †2,5741956–1969
9 Choji Murata (R) †2,3631968–1990
10 Masahiro Yamamoto (L)2,3101986–2015
11 Minoru Murayama (R) †2,2711959–1972
12 Shoichi Ono (L)2,2441956–1970
13 Toshiya Sugiuchi (L)2,1562002–2015
14 Hiromi Makihara (R)2,1111983–2001
15 Kazuhisa Kawaguchi (L)2,0921981–1998
16 Hisashi Yamada (R) †2,0581969–1988
17 Nobuyuki Hoshino (L)2,0411984–1999
18 Hiromu Matsuoka (R)2,0081968–1985

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References

See also