Toru Ogawa

Toru Ogawa (小川 亨)

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 5' 8", Weight 160 lb.

• School Rikkyo University
• High School Miyazaki Commercial High School

• Born August 1, 1945 in Miyazaki, Miyazaki Japan

BR register page

Biographical Information

Toru Ogawa played in Nippon Pro Baseball.

Ogawa was drafted by the Kintetsu Buffaloes in the third round of the 1967 NPB draft. He hit .256/.339/.349 with 3 homers in his rookie year. Ogawa batted .248/.364/.402 with 11 homers in 1969. He improved to .270/.347/.420 with a career-high 24 steals in 1970, and led the league in triples with five. The Miyazaki native broke out in 1971, and recorded a .315/.403/.493 line with a career-high 20 homers. He was 5th in batting (.022 behind Shinichi Eto) and 2nd in OBP (.003 behind Eto). Ogawa led the league in triples again with eight in 1972, and he had a .271/.376/.426 batting line with 10 dingers. He hit .289/.360/.481 with 19 homers in 1973.

Ogawa was selected into the 1974 NPB All-Star Games for the first All-Star appearances in his career, but he went 0-for-6. He ended up batting .276/.392/.352 with 7 homers in the 1974 season. He attended the All-Star Game again in the next summer, and hit a single off Sohachi Aniya in Game 1. He recorded a .289/.394/.360 batting line in 1975, and led the league in OBP. He broke the record held by Yoshio Yoshida for 180 consecutive at-bats without a strikeout, reaching the mark on September 6. The Miyazaki native slumped to .233/.307/.292 in 1976, then bounced back to .313/.375/.399 in 1977. The veteran infielder extended his stable performance in the next two years, batting .321/.384/.477 and .277/.356/.426 respectively. In the 1979 Nippon Series, Ogawa went 6-for-24 but couldn't prevent the Buffaloes from beating by the Hiroshima Carp in 7 games.

Ogawa hit .323/.404/.523 with 15 homers in 1980, and won the only Diamond Glove Award of his career (as a first baseman). He was 6th in batting (.035 behind Leron Lee) and 4th in OBP (.030 behind Shuzo Arita). Ogawa shined in the 1980 Nippon Series, when he recorded a 9-for-23 with 5 RBI and won the Fighting Spirit Award. Ogawa was still a productive hitter in his late career, hitting .295/.369/.437 in 1981, .301/.350/.438 in 1982 and .269/.364/.406 in 1983. Ogawa then announced his retirement after only batting .234/.316/.361 in 1984. Ogawa was the hitting coach for the Buffaloes from 1989 to 1992, and became the defense coach for the Orix Blue Wave in 1993. He was also the hitting coach for the minor team of the Blue Wave in 1994.

Overall, Ogawa had hit .284/.369/.419 with 162 homers in 17 seasons in NPB. He was the 46th to reach 1500 hits, and held the club record for most career games played with 1,908.