Joseph Washington "Jellybean" Bryant was an American professional basketball player and coach. He played for the Philadelphia 76ers, San Diego Clippers, and Houston Rockets of the National Basketball Association (NBA). He also played for several teams in Italy and one in France. Bryant was the head coach of the WNBA's Los Angeles Sparks from 2005 to 2007 and returned to that position for the remainder of the 2011 WNBA season. Bryant also coached in Japan and Thailand. His son, basketball player Kobe Bryant, was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame.
Robert Christen Swift is an American former professional basketball player who last played for Spanish club Círculo Gijón Baloncesto y Conocimiento of the LEB Plata league. He played in the National Basketball Association for the Seattle SuperSonics / Oklahoma City Thunder from 2004 through 2009, for the Seattle Aviators and Snohomish County Explosion of the National Athletic Basketball League in 2010, and for the Tokyo Apache of the bj League in 2010–11. He stands at 7 feet 1 inch (2.16 m) and played the center position.
Direct Relief is a nonprofit humanitarian organization whose mission is to improve the lives of people in poverty or emergency situations by providing the appropriate medical resources. The charity provides emergency medical assistance and disaster relief in the United States and internationally. The organization is headed by an independent board of directors and its president and CEO, Thomas Tighe.
The bj league was a professional basketball league in Japan that began in November 2005 as a six-team league. The league was operated as a competitor to the established Japan Super League which was run by the Japan Basketball Association, the official governing body of basketball in Japan. Over the next ten years the league saw continual expansion, with at least one new team joining every season, reaching 24 teams divided into two conferences in its final season in 2015–16. Turkish Airlines was the major sponsor of the 2014–15 and 2015–16 seasons.
Hiroshi Mikitani is a Japanese billionaire business magnate and writer. He is the founder and CEO of Rakuten, Inc. He is also the president of Crimson Group, chairman of the football club Vissel Kobe, chairman of Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, and a board member of Lyft.
IsraAID is an Israel-based non-governmental organization that responds to emergencies all over the world with targeted humanitarian help. This includes disaster relief, from search and rescue to rebuilding communities and schools, to providing aid packages, medical assistance, and post-psychotrauma care. IsraAID has also been involved in emergency response and international development projects in more than 60 countries, with focuses on Water, Sanitation & Hygiene, public health and medical care, education, and mental health and protection.
The Ehime Orange Vikings are a Japanese professional basketball team based in Matsuyama, Ehime Prefecture, that competes in the second division of the B.League.
On 11 March 2011, at 14:46 JST, a 9.0–9.1 undersea megathrust earthquake occurred in the Pacific Ocean, 72 km (45 mi) east of the Oshika Peninsula of the Tōhoku region. It lasted approximately six minutes and caused a tsunami. It is sometimes known in Japan as the "Great East Japan Earthquake", among other names. The disaster is often referred to by its numerical date, 3.11.
Operation Tomodachi was a United States Armed Forces assistance operation to support Japan in disaster relief following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. The operation took place from 12 March to 4 May 2011; involved 24,000 U.S. servicemembers, 189 aircraft, 24 naval ships; and cost $90 million.
Following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, Japan received messages of condolence and offers of assistance from a range of international leaders. According to Japan's foreign ministry, 163 countries and regions, and 43 international organizations had offered assistance to Japan as of September 15, 2011. The magnitude of the earthquake was estimated at 9.1. This article is a list of charitable and humanitarian responses to the disaster from governments and non-governmental organizations. As of March 2012, donations to areas affected by the disaster totalled ¥520 billion and 930,000 people have assisted in disaster recovery efforts.
The aftermath of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami included both a humanitarian crisis and massive economic impacts. The tsunami created over 300,000 refugees in the Tōhoku region of Japan, and resulted in shortages of food, water, shelter, medicine and fuel for survivors. 15,900 deaths have been confirmed. In response to the crisis, the Japanese government mobilized the Self-Defence Forces, while many countries sent search and rescue teams to help search for survivors. Aid organizations both in Japan and worldwide also responded, with the Japanese Red Cross reporting $1 billion in donations. The economic impact included both immediate problems, with industrial production suspended in many factories, and the longer term issue of the cost of rebuilding which has been estimated at ¥10 trillion.
The Reconstruction Agency is an agency of the Japanese government established on February 10, 2012 to coordinate reconstruction activities related to the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.
Honoo Hamaguchi is a Japanese basketball coach. He originates from Oshima Island. As of 2011 Hamaguchi had been a part of the Japanese basketball league longer than most of the other coaches of Japanese basketball teams had been a part. Ed Odeven of The Japan Times said that Hamaguchi works for success but does not seek attention despite being in a social media era.
The National Basketball League (NBL) was a professional basketball league in Japan run by the Japan Basketball Association (JBA). The first NBL season started in Autumn 2013, replacing the JBA's previous top-flight league, the Japan Basketball League. Below the NBL was the National Basketball Development League (NBDL), which was the successor to the former JBL 2 division.
The B.League is a professional men's basketball league in Japan that began play in September 2016. The league is operated by the Japan Professional Basketball League and was formed as a result of a merger between the National Basketball League that was operated by the FIBA-affiliated Japan Basketball Association and the independently operated bj league. The merger had been mandated by FIBA as a condition to Japan having its membership resumed following suspension in November 2014.
The Fukushima Firebonds are a professional basketball team that compete in the second division of the Japanese B.League.
The Yokohama B-Corsairs are a Japanese professional basketball team that compete in the first division of the B.League. Following the team's establishment in 2010, they participated in the Eastern Conference of the bj league for five seasons and in 2013 became the first team based in the Kanto region of Japan to win the league's championship.
Michael Katsuhisa is a former professional basketball player and the head coach of the Shinshu Brave Warriors in the Japanese B.League.
Yokohama Excellence is a Japanese professional basketball club that will compete in the third division of Japan's B.League. Prior to the B.League's establishment, the club played in the National Basketball Development League, winning the championship in all three years of the league's existence. The team's home arena was the Itabashi Azusawa Gymnasium in Itabashi, Tokyo. The team also played some home matches at the Izumi Citizen's Gymnasium in Tachikawa, Tokyo.
The Hiroshima Lightning were a professional basketball team based in Hiroshima, Japan. They spent one season (2015–2016) in the Western Conference of the Japanese bj league and then folded after being denied entry into the B.League, the bj league's replacement.
