Nippon Professional Baseball All-Star Series

The Nippon Professional Baseball All-Star Series is an annual baseball series of All-Star Games between players from the Central League and the Pacific League, currently selected by a combination of fans, players, coaches, and managers. The All-Star Game usually occurs in early to mid-July and marks the symbolic halfway point in the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) season (though not the mathematical halfway point; in most seasons, that takes place one week earlier). Each series consists of two or three games.

History

The first NPB All-Star game was played in 1951.

For many years, mimicking the gaijin waku rule of the NPB, ^[1] each All-Star team was limited to two foreign players. ^[2]

Game results

Year	Winning league	Score	Overall record	Venue	Host team	MVP
2004	Pacific	3–1	Pacific 1-0	Nagoya Dome	Chunichi Dragons	Daisuke Matsuzaka
	Pacific	2–1	Pacific 2-0	Nagano Olympic Stadium	none	Tsuyoshi Shinjo
2005	Central	6–5	Pacific 2-1	Seibu Dome	Seibu Lions	Tatsuhiko Kinjo
	Central	5–3	Tie 2-2	Koshien Stadium	Hanshin Tigers	Tomonori Maeda
2006	Central	3–1	Central 3-2	Meiji Jingu Stadium	Yakult Swallows	Norichika Aoki
	Central	7–4	Central 4-2	Sun Marine Stadium	none	Atsushi Fujimoto
2007	Central	4–0	Central 5-2	Tokyo Dome	Yomiuri Giants	Alex Ramírez
	Central	11–5	Central 6-2	Fullcast Stadium	Rakuten Eagles	Shinnosuke Abe
2008	Pacific	5–4	Central 6-3	Kyocera Dome Osaka	Orix Buffaloes	Takeshi Yamasaki
	Central	11–6	Central 7-3	Yokohama Stadium	Yokohama BayStars	Masahiro Araki
2009	Central	10–8	Central 8-3	Sapporo Dome	Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters	Norichika Aoki
	Pacific	7–4	Central 8-4	Mazda Stadium	Hiroshima Toyo Carp	Nobuhiko Matsunaka
2010	Central	4–1	Central 8-5	Yahoo Dome	Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks	Shinnosuke Abe
	Tie	5–5	Central 8-5-1	Hard Off Eco Stadium	none	Yasuyuki Kataoka
2011	Central	9–4	Central 9-5-1	Nagoya Dome	Chunichi Dragons	Kazuhiro Hatakeyama
	Pacific	4–3	Central 9-6-1	QVC Marine Field	Chiba Lotte Marines	Takeya Nakamura
	Pacific	5–0	Central 9-7-1	Kleenex Stadium	Rakuten Eagles	Atsunori Inaba
2012	Central	4–1	Central 10-7-1	Kyocera Dome Osaka	Orix Buffaloes	Norihiro Nakamura
	Central	4–0	Central 11-7-1	Botchan Stadium	none	Kenta Maeda
	Pacific	6–2	Central 11-8-1	Iwate Prefectural Baseball Stadium	none	DaiKan Yoh
2013	Tie	1–1	Central 11-8-2	Sapporo Dome	Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters	Hirokazu Sawamura
	Central	3–1	Central 12-8-2	Meiji Jingu Stadium	Tokyo Yakult Swallows	Takahiro Arai
	Pacific	3–1	Central 12-9-2	Iwaki Green Stadium	none	Seiichi Uchikawa
2014	Central	7–0	Central 13-9-2	Seibu Dome	Saitama Seibu Lions	Brad Eldred
	Pacific	12–6	Central 13-10-2	Koshien Stadium	Hanshin Tigers	Yuki Yanagita
2015	Central	8–6	Central 14-10-2	Tokyo Dome	Yomiuri Giants	Shintaro Fujinami
	Central	8–3	Central 15-10-2	Mazda Stadium	Hiroshima Toyo Carp	Tsubasa Aizawa
2016	Central	5–4	Central 16-10-2	Yahoo Dome	Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks	Yoshitomo Tsutsugoh
	Tie	5–5	Central 16-10-3	Yokohama Stadium	Yokohama DeNA BayStars	Shohei Ohtani
2017	Pacific	6–2	Central 16-11-3	Nagoya Dome	Chunichi Dragons	Seiichi Uchikawa
	Pacific	3–1	Central 16-12-3	Zozo Marine Stadium	Chiba Lotte Marines	Alfredo Despaigne
2018	Pacific	7–6	Central 16-13-3	Kyocera Dome Osaka	Orix Buffaloes	Tomoya Mori
	Pacific	5–1	Central 16-14-3	Fujisakidai Prefectural Baseball Stadium	none	Sōsuke Genda
2019	Pacific	6–3	Central 16-15-3	Tokyo Dome	Yomiuri Giants	Tomoya Mori
	Central	11–3	Central 17-15-3	Koshien Stadium	Hanshin Tigers	Kōji Chikamoto
2020	Series canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
2021	Central	5-4	Central 18-15-3	MetLife Dome	Saitama Seibu Lions	Ryosuke Kikuchi
	Pacific	4-3	Central 18-16-3	Rakuten Seimei Park Miyagi	Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles	Hiroaki Shimauchi
2022 [3] [4] [5]	Pacific	3-2	Central 18-17-3	Fukuoka PayPay Dome	Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks	Kotaro Kiyomiya
	Pacific	2-1	Tie 18-18-3	Matsuyama Central Park Baseball Stadium	none	Yuki Yanagita
2023	Pacific	8-1	Pacific 19-18-3	Nagoya Dome	Chunichi Dragons	Yuki Yanagita
	Pacific	6-1	Pacific 20-18-3	Mazda Stadium	Hiroshima Toyo Carp	Chusei Mannami
2024	Central	11-6	Pacific 20-19-3	Es Con Field Hokkaido	Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters	Shugo Maki
	Pacific	16-10	Pacific 21-19-3	Meiji Jingu Stadium	Tokyo Yakult Swallows	Toshiya Satoh
2025	Pacific	5-1	Pacific 22-19-3	Kyocera Dome Osaka	Orix Buffaloes	Yuma Tongu
	Pacific	10-7	Pacific 23-19-3	Yokohama Stadium	Yokohama DeNA BayStars	Kotaro Kiyomiya

Hanshin Tigers player voting controversy

The fan votes of the starters of the 2023 All Star Series revealed 9 of the 10 highest voted starters were Hanshin Tigers players. It was the third time in NPB players from the same team led the voting in all positions. ^[6] The controversy was garnered as some of the positions, such as catcher, which in question was Ryutaro Umeno, were voted in for the sole purpose of being voted in by fans, as he did not produce numbers good enough to warrant an all star game appearance, compared to that of a player like Takumi Ohshiro. Others, like Teruaki Sato at third base, were good, but there had been players who were much more deserving to start, like Toshiro Miyazaki and Kazuma Okamoto. ^[7]

See also

• Major League Baseball All-Star Game
• Baseball awards#Japan

References

1. "Foreign Player Restrictions?". Japanese Baseball.
2. Whiting, Robert. You Gotta Have Wa (Vintage Departures, 1989), p. 275.
3. "Kotaro Kiyomiya walk-off homer lifts PL in NPB All-Star Game 1". 27 July 2022. Archived from the original on 2022-07-27.
4. "Yuki Yanagita lifts Pacific League with home run in All-Star series finale". The Japan Times. 28 July 2022. Archived from the original on 2022-07-28.
5. "Yanagita earns MVP as Pacific sweeps series". japannews.yomiuri.co.jp. 2022-07-28. Retrieved 2025-03-27.
6. "日職／阪神虎人氣太狂 明星賽9位置全「霸榜」拿下最高票│TVBS新聞網" [Hanshin Tigers are too popular, and the 9 positions in the All Star game are all "dominant" and win the highest votes]. TVBS (in Chinese (Taiwan)). Retrieved 2023-10-30.
7. "日職》明星賽一隊霸榜讓日媒直呼異常 挨批：粉絲程度就這樣了 - 自由體育" [The first team of the star game of "Japanese Career" dominated the list, which made the Japanese media call it abnormal and criticized]. sports.ltn.com.tw. 2023-06-20. Retrieved 2023-10-30.