Baseball Draft Day

What Is Baseball Draft Day?

Every November 17th is "Baseball Draft Day" (ドラフト記念日, Dorafuto Kinenbi) in Japan. On November 17, 1965, the first NPB (Nippon Professional Baseball) Draft (新人選手選択会議, Shinjin Senshu Sentaku Kaigi) — the system by which professional baseball teams select amateur players for recruitment — was held. The introduction of the draft system replaced the previous free-agent system for new players, in which wealthy teams (particularly the Yomiuri Giants) could sign the best amateurs through financial inducement, creating competitive imbalance. The draft was designed to give weaker teams first pick of the best available talent.

The NPB Draft System

Japan's NPB Draft is held each autumn, with teams selecting amateur players (from high schools, universities, and companies' industrial league teams) — when several teams name the same player in the first round, a lottery decides, the second round follows a waiver order in which lower-ranked teams pick first, the third round reverses that order, and the two orders then alternate. Unlike the American MLB Draft, Japan's draft is a highly theatrical, nationally watched event — covered live on television with considerable drama as the selections are announced and teams learn which promising young players they will be developing. The draft has become an important event in Japanese baseball culture, with media tracking top prospects for months beforehand.

Competitive Balance and Draft Reform

The NPB draft has been modified multiple times since 1965 to address competitive balance concerns. Over the years it has included features such as "reverse nomination" (gyaku-shimei) and a "preferred player" slot, as well as a period (2005–2007) when high school and non-high school players were drafted separately. Today it uses a lottery for teams competing for the same first-round pick and alternating waiver and reverse-waiver orders for later rounds. These mechanisms reflect ongoing efforts to balance the desires of players to join their preferred team with the competitive interest of maintaining a level playing field among clubs.

Kōshien Stars and Draft Expectations

Japan's Kōshien high school baseball tournament (see August 18th) is the primary showcase for the players most sought by NPB scouts. Outstanding performances at Kōshien generate draft attention, and the annual drama of which high school stars will be selected by which teams is closely followed by baseball fans. The connection between high school baseball glory at Kōshien and professional career launch through the draft is one of Japanese baseball's most compelling narratives.

Fun Facts

• Multiple team drafts: When multiple teams want the same player, they submit slips simultaneously, and the competing teams' names are drawn by lottery to determine who gets the right to negotiate with the player first. This lottery moment — shown live on television — is one of the draft's most dramatic moments. The record is eight teams, set in 1989 when eight clubs named pitcher Hideo Nomo (later matched by Hideo Koike in 1990); the Kintetsu Buffaloes won the lottery.
• Shohei Ohtani's draft: Shohei Ohtani was selected by the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters in the 2012 NPB Draft, as the only team to name him in the first round, despite initially indicating he wished to go directly to the American leagues — the Fighters' successful recruitment of Ohtani and his subsequent two-way success in NPB before his MLB move is one of Japanese baseball's most consequential draft stories.