Hiroshi Oshita

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Hiroshi Oshita (大下 弘)
(Pon-chan)

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Biographical Information[edit]

Hiroshi Oshita is a Japanese Baseball Hall of Famer who played 14 years in Nippon Pro Baseball.

When the Senators were founded in 1946, Oshita's schoolmate in Meiji Saburo Yokozawa persuaded him to join them. He soon became the main cleanup hitter for the new team, and blasted 20 homers with a .281/.366/.522 batting line. He was the first player ever in Japan pro baseball history to crush more than 20 homers. He also led the Japanese Baseball League in total bases and slugging, and ranked 2nd in RBI (21 behind Kazuto Tsuruoka).

Oshita extended his solid batting and hit .315/.387/.536 with 17 homers in 1947. He started to use a blue bat, similar to another superstar Tetsuharu Kawakami, who used a red bat. He led the league in home runs again, and also won the batting title and the first Best Nine award after war as an outfielder. After this year, when another league (the National Baseball League) was founded, one of their managers Konosuke Otsuka tried to poach Oshita to the new league with a twenty thousands yen-per-month salary. (His original salary was four thousands yen-per-month). Oshita almost jumped (he verbally agreed), but the Tokyu Flyers raised his salary and kept their franchise player. Although Oshita was the main MVP candidate this year, the MVP went to Tadashi Wakabayashi due to this incident.

He used a bamboo bat on June 10 the next season, and the league fined him 100 yen. He slumped to .266/.325/.417 with 16 homers this year, but ranked 3rd in homers (9 behind Noboru Aota and Kawakami) and 5th in RBI (36 behind Fumio Fujimura). The Hyogo native bounced back with a .305/.387/.626 batting line in 1949, and blasted a career-high 38 homers. He was 3rd in homers (8 behind Fujimura), 6th in RBI (40 behind Fujimura) and won his second Best Nine award. He also became the only player in NPB history to have a 7-for-7 game without extra innings.

When the JPBL split into two leagues in 1950, the Flyers joined the Pacific League. Oshita improved to .339/.423/.539 with 12 homers, and won the first PL batting title. He also led the league in on-base percentage, and won his third Best Nine award. He was selected into the first NPB All-Star Game - 1951 NPB All-Star Game, but only went 1-for-11 in the Games that year. The Hyogo native ended up hitting .383/.465/.704 with 26 homers, and won the Best Nine award again. He broke the PL record for highest batting average and slugging percentage, and also won his first PL home run title.

After the 1950 season, Oshita requested a trade because of an argument with the Flyers about salary. The Nishitetsu Lions then traded Yasuhiro Fukami and Toshiaki Ogata to the Flyers for him. Oshita was still productive with the Lions in 1952, and attended the 1952 NPB All-Star Game. He was 2-for-9 in those two games. The Kobe native ended up hitting .307/.388/.504 with 13 homers, ranked 4th in batting (.029 behind Shigeya Iijima) and won his fifth Best Nine.

Oshita was selected for the 1953 NPB All-Star Games, but he went 1-for-8. He ended up hitting .307/.344/.481 with 12 homers in 1953, and won the Best Nine again. Due to the prospect Futoshi Nakanishi shining, Oshita lost the cleanup hitter spot this year, but he still ranked 4th in batting (.011 behind Isami Okamoto). He improved to .321/.386/.537 with 22 homers in the next season, and finally led his team to win the pennant for the first time in his career. He won his seventh Best Nine, and was named the Pacific League MVP. He was 2nd in batting (.016 behind Larry Raines), 5th in homers (9 behind Nakanishi) and 4th in RBI (9 behind Kazuhiro Yamauchi). Oshita went 7-for-24 in the 1954 Japan Series but his team was beaten by the Chunichi Dragons in 7 games. He won the Fighting Spirit Award as the MVP of the losing squad.

The slugger only hit .301/.361/.443 with 12 homers in 1955, ranked 6th in batting (.031 behind Nakanishi) and ended his 6-year streak for winning Best Nine honors. He suffered from nephritis and only had a .259/.304/.346 batting line in the next season. In the 1956 Nippon Series, Oshita was 5-for-24 but hit a clutch 2-run double to help the Lions beat the Yomiuri Giants, and he finally won his first Nippon Series title.

The veteran bounced back in 1957. He was selected into the 1957 NPB All-Star Game, went 2-for-4 with 3 RBI and won the MVP in Game 1, and collected a single in Game 2. He ended up hitting .306/.354/.405, ranked 4th in batting (.025 behind Yamauchi) and won his eighth and last Best Nine award. In the 1957 Nippon Series, Oshita went 7-for-17 with a homer off Taketoshi Yoshihara in Game 3. The Lions beat the Giants in 5 games, and Oshita won the Nippon Series Most Valuable Player.

Oshita only played 62 games with a .221/.265/.286 batting line due to a injured left knee in 1958, and he never recovered from that injury. Although he still batted .303/.344/.378 in 1959, he was out due to the injury since August, and Oshita announced his retirement after the 1959 season. After retiring, he became the hitting coach for the Hankyu Braves in 1961, and managed the Flyers in 1968. He only led them for a season, then quit after the Flyers were only 30-46 in the first 80 games. He also served as hitting coach for the Taiyo Whales from 1974 to 1975. He suffered a stroke in 1978, then committed suicide the next year. Oshita was inducted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame in 1980.

Overall, Oshita had hit .303/.368/.490 with 1,667 hits and 201 homers in 14 seasons in NPB.

Related Sites[edit]

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