Yozo Nagafuchi

Youzou Nagafuchi (永淵 洋三)

• Bats Left, Throws Left
• Height 5' 6", Weight 143 lb.

• High School Saga High School

• Born May 3, 1942 in Saga, Saga Japan

BR register page

Biographical Information

Youzou Nagafuchi has played in Nippon Pro Baseball.

Nagafuchi was drafted by the Kintetsu Buffaloes in the second round of the 1967 NPB draft. He was a two-way player in his rookie year, when he batted .274/.327/.415 with 5 homers and pitched 19 1/3 innings with a 2.84 ERA. The Buffaloes decided to let Nagafuchi become a full-time batter in 1969, and he had the best performance in his career. Nagafuchi was selected into the 1969 NPB All-Star Game, and collected 2 singles in Game 1 - from Yoshiro Sotokoba in the 3rd and Shiroku Ishido in the 5th inning. He hit a single off Tomo Wako in the 6th and collected a RBI single from Masaji Hiramatsu in the 9th inning of Game 2. In Game 3, Nagafuchi blasted a homer off Tsuneo Horiuchi in the 1st inning, then hit a single off Kazumi Takahashi in 4th and had another single from Masaichi Kaneda in the 8th inning. Nagafuchi ended up batting .333/.379/.527 with 20 homers, and won the Best Nine as an outfielder. He led the league in batting average (tied with Isao Harimoto), led in hits (162), ranked 2nd in runs (15 behind Atsushi Nagaike), 4th in steals (23, 25 behind Toshizo Sakamoto), 5th in RBI (27 behind Nagaike), 10th in homers and 3th in OPS.

Nagafuchi participated in the All-Star Game again in the next summer, but went 0-for-2 in that event. He batted .295/.367/.462 and ranked 9th in hits in the 1970 season. The Saga native extended his elite performance and recorded a .300/.343/.441 batting line with 14 homers in 1971. He was 6th in hits (7 behind Katsuo Osugi) and 5th in steal s(43 behind Yutaka Fukumoto). Nagafuchi was selected into the 1972 NPB All-Star Game, and went 1-for-7 in the All-Star Games; the only hit was a single from Yataro Oishi in the 8th inning of Game 1. He hit .300/.343/.463 with 22 homers and a career-high 12 assists in the 1972 season. He was 3th in hits (18 behind Harimoto), 9th in homers (19 behind Nagaike) and 10th in batting average (.058 behind Harimoto).

The 1972 season was the last productive season for Nagafuchi. Because of alcoholism, Nagafuchi's batting condition severely declined, and he only batted .231/.263/.287 in the 1973 season. He was replaced by young outfielders like Kyosuke Sasaki, and the Buffaloes traded him with Toshikazu Hattori and Hidehiko Ichihashi to the Nippon-Ham Fighters for Toshizo Sakamoto and Kenichi Yaezawa after the 1975 season. Nagafuchi was still unable to find back his contact ability, hit .260/.321/.380, .222/.287/.374 and .234/.290/.386 from 1976 to 1978. He announced his retirement after the 1979 season.

Overall, Nagafuchi had hit .278/.333/.423 in 12 seasons in NPB.