<figure id="attachment_406645" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-406645" style="width: 4183px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="c651fc91"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2024/12/cb59910b1819c24fd0c6d0e7b4434f64.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-406645" class="wp-caption-text">Ohgi&#8217;s &#8220;disciples&#8221; gathered at his induction party for the Baseball Hall of Fame. From Ohgi&#8217;s right to left: Ichiro, Yoshii, Nomo, Kida, Taguchi (from the December 24, 2004 issue).</figcaption></figure>
<p> What did &#8220;FRIDAY&#8221; report 10, 20, or 30 years ago? In &#8220;Playback Friday,&#8221; we take a look back at the topics that were hot at the time. This time, we will look back at the article <span class="strongInContent">&#8220;Ichiro, Nomo, Taguchi, Kida, and other pupils gather in large numbers,&#8221;</span> which appeared in the December 24, 2004 issue 20 years ago! <span class="strongInContent">A live report of the &#8220;reunion&#8221; of the Major League Baseball team and its manager, Ohgi</span>.</p>
<p> On December 7, 2004, a party was held at a hotel in Osaka City to celebrate the induction of Akira Ohgi, then 69, manager of the Orix Buffaloes, into the Baseball Hall of Fame. (Descriptions in parentheses are taken from past articles.)</p>
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<h3><span class="strongInContent"> The distinguished lineup that gathered for Ohgi&#8217;s induction</span></h3>
<p> When this reporter went to the venue of Ohgi&#8217;s &#8220;Baseball Hall of Fame induction party,&#8221; which was &#8220;planned to be held privately&#8221; (according to an official), the place was already filled with people, people, people. When this reporter went to the venue of Ohgi&#8217;s &#8220;Baseball Hall of Fame induction party,&#8221; the place was already filled with people, people, people.</p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> In front of the venue, a huge flower from Kazuhiro Kiyohara of the Giants, which was said by a hotel employee to be &#8220;definitely worth several hundred thousand yen,&#8221; was placed in front of the venue. The hotel even paid lip service to the event through Yoshiaki Kanamura, a Kintetsu alumnus and baseball critic, by saying, &#8220;If you keep your door open, we may be able to play at the Osaka Dome in two years.</span></p>
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<p> Inside the venue, big-name baseball alumni such as Kazuhisa Inao, the &#8220;Iron Man,&#8221; and Futoshi Nakanishi, the &#8220;Monster Boy,&#8221; exchanged glasses with each other. The crowd included Ralph Bryant and other Kintetsu regulars from 1988, when the team drew the second game of the legendary doubleheader and lost the championship, the Orix mainstays from 1996, when the team overcame the Great Hanshin Earthquake to win the Japan championship, Senichi Hoshino, Hanshin SD, and many others. Senichi Hoshino, Hanshin SD, and many others.</p>
<p> However, the person who was flashed the most that day was Ichiro, who had returned to Japan only to attend the party. Ichiro, once famous for his &#8220;misanthropy,&#8221; was smiling as he was photographed and shook hands throughout the event.</p>
<div data-friday-nextpage-lead=" He was smiling as he took pictures and shook hands with people throughout the party."></div>
<h3><span class="strongInContent">Suddenly, the &#8220;magic&#8221; burst forth.</span></h3>
<p> Director Ohgi was also red-faced and happy. <span class="strongInContent">He said to</span> Sakura Yokomine <span class="strongInContent">, &#8220;I had a drink with your father the other day.</span> I had a drink with my father the other day. In the midst of this atmosphere, Director Ohgi burst out with a tremendous &#8220;magic&#8221; trick.</p>
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<p><span class="strongInContent"> He said, &#8220;I don&#8217;t care if it&#8217;s tampering or whatever. Come back, you guys!&#8221;</span></p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> As soon as the old and new Major League teams, including Ichiro (Mariners), So Taguchi (Cardinals), Hideo Nomo (Dodgers), Masato Yoshii (Orix), and Masao Kida (Mariners), took the stage, Akira Ohgi, manager of the Orix Buffaloes, began to make passionate overtures to them.</span></p>
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<p><span class="strongInContent"> If it weren&#8217;t for Mr. Ohgi, I wouldn&#8217;t be where I am today. I wouldn&#8217;t mind having the manager put the number 51 on my back.</span></p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> I would like to finish my career under him.</span><span class="strongInContent"> I want to finish my career under him.</span></p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> When his &#8220;disciples&#8221; responded with social pleasantries, the manager went even more berserk.</span></p>
<p><span class="strongInContent"> When the &#8220;disciples&#8221; responded with social pleasantries, the commander went even more off the rails: &#8220;Is Koizumi (Takashi Koizumi, president of the baseball team) around? Is he around when it&#8217;s inconvenient? （I&#8217;ll pay (Yoshii&#8217;s) salary out of my own pocket, so how about the rest as an incentive?</span></p>
<p> This puzzled the president of the baseball team.</p>
<div data-friday-nextpage-lead=" The reason why he said it was a living funeral"></div>
<h3><span class="strongInContent">I think of this as my burial before my death.</span></h3>
<p> Akira Ohgi served as manager of the Kintetsu Buffaloes and the Orix Blue Wave, and his ever-changing leadership style was known as the &#8220;Ohgi Magic. In addition to discovering Ichiro, he is also known for having trained many Japanese Major Leaguers, including Hideo Nomo, Shigetoshi Hasegawa, and So Taguchi. The fact that so many people were present at the party on that day was probably due to his personal virtues.</p>
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<p> The 2004 off-season was also the time when Kintetsu and Orix merged to form the Orix Buffaloes. And Mr. Ohgi had returned to the manager&#8217;s position after a three-year absence when he was asked to take over as manager. Perhaps that was the reason he gave such an enthusiastic love call to his former disciples who had gone to the majors.</p>
<p> At the party, Ohgi <span class="strongInContent">said, &#8220;I think of this as a funeral before my death.</span> In fact, he had been fighting lung cancer, but only some of the people involved knew about it.</p>
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<p> He managed to fight through the &#8217;04 season with wounds all over his body, but the day after the final game of the season, he announced that he would step down as director. Two months later, on December 15, he passed away. Just before he died, he told his doctor <span class="strongInContent">, &#8220;I have a dinner appointment with Ichiro on the 20th. Let me live until then.</span></p>
<div data-friday-nextpage-lead=" The splendid group of people who gathered for Director Ohgi&#39;s big day"></div>
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<figure id="attachment_406646" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-406646" style="width: 3374px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="ee210e0f"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2024/12/308da3825d5a4ac612acdd48b5f6c78c.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-406646" class="wp-caption-text">Flowers presented by Kiyohara. They are said to cost several hundred thousand yen (from the December 24, 2004 issue).</figcaption></figure>
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<figure id="attachment_406647" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-406647" style="width: 3374px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="e8d60139"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2024/12/4e1eefc2ce84a07fc18bcb32b0b3e7d5.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-406647" class="wp-caption-text"> Ralph Bryant, who played an active role in the Kintetsu baseball team, was crunching on a shrimp (from the December 24, 2004 issue).</figcaption></figure>
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<figure id="attachment_406652" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-406652" style="width: 3374px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="152d8a4a"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2024/12/6e7bb364d018db0161ab52c88a2e4211.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-406652" class="wp-caption-text"> Yoshitomo Tani and his wife Ryoko were in the corner of the hall, perhaps out of concern (from the December 24, 2004 issue).</figcaption></figure>
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<figure id="attachment_406650" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-406650" style="width: 2372px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="73607d9b"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2024/12/9c477e7d5cdec6f226ab1d9ae11813a9.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-406650" class="wp-caption-text"> Ichiro says that Mr. Ohgi is the only manager whom he calls only &#8220;manager&#8221; (from the December 24, 2004 issue).</figcaption></figure>
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 In this issue of Playback, we look back at what we reported 10, 20, and 30 years ago. This time, we will look back at the party held in December 2004 for Orix manager Akira Ohgi, which was attended by a splendid lineup of old and new major leaguers.

Playback ’04] “Come back, you guys! to his student-athletes in the majors.

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