Nippon Professional》12 teams and 165 people were defeated! The hitting king, the winning shot king, and the WBC national player are all on the list.

The Japan League’s second out-of-combat notice period officially ends today (30th). In addition to the previous first notice, a total of 165 players from 12 teams have received out-of-competition notices this fall, including 91 players in the Central League and 74 players in the Pacific League. Many of them have won the slugging king, the win-win king, and even been selected for the Japanese team in the World Baseball Classic.

In terms of teams, the Giants have 22 people who have received out-of-competition notices, the most among the 12 teams, followed by SoftBank with 19 people, Yakult with 17 people, DeNA and Chunichi with 15 people each, Hiroshima and Rakuten with 13 people each, Rhodes with 12 people, Orix with 11 people, Seibu with 10 people, Hanshin and Nippon Ham with 9 people each.

The most eye-catching name among them is Hiroshima infielder Kaito Kozono. He won the Central League batting title last year and was selected for the WBC Japan team in March this year. However, his contract was not renewed by the team due to off-field issues such as "zombie cartridges". He became a rare case of a main star being sidelined. His subsequent developments have also attracted great attention.

There are also topical stars on the pitching side. Yakult includes Kohiro Aoyagi, who won the winning pitching title with Hanshin in two consecutive seasons in 2021 and 2022, and Reito Taguchi, who made 33 saves in a single season in 2023. They have all received notices of being out of action; Shintaro Fujinami, who moved to the major leagues from Hanshin and played for DeNA this year, and has accumulated 58 wins in his Japanese career, has not been renewed.

The outfielders include Shogo Nakamura, who once served as Rhodes captain and won one Best Nine and three Gold Gloves. He also received a notice of ineligibility and still hopes to continue his playing career; in 2023, hit player Yuma Tonnomiya was released from his contract by Orix due to injuries. The team has proposed to change the contract to a training contract.