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The story
Yomiuri Giants’ first-round draft pick, Yokohama High School pitcher Shoki Oda (18), has declared his intent to pursue a career in American baseball and says he won’t enter contract talks. When the Giants made their customary courtesy visit to Yokohama High School on the 10th, Oda himself was absent — the whole thing wrapped up in about five minutes, with Scouting Director Yuujin Mizuno and others simply explaining the situation to the school. Mizuno reportedly said, “I’m sorry for the trouble this has caused.” On 5ch, opinion split between those criticizing the Giants for forcing the pick against the player’s wishes and those defending the move as technically within the draft rules, sparking a heated debate.
[Giants] Oda Shoki’s Courtesy Visit Ends in 5 Minutes With Player Absent: “Sorry for the fuss…” Says Scouting Director Mizuno
On the 10th, a courtesy visit was held at Yokohama High School for the Giants’ first-round draft pick, pitcher Shoki Oda (18), who has announced his intention to pursue a career in American baseball.
Oda himself was not present. Instead, Scouting Director Yuujin Mizuno (61) and Scout Director Shinsuke Kuremaki greeted the school side, represented by head coach Hiroaki Murata (40) and others.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Sure, no rules were broken — but the fact is, forcing the pick through against his wishes is causing real trouble right now. Issuing an apology first is just common sense.
No, it's not the right call. 'Anything's fine as long as it's within the rules' is exactly the kind of move that gets you hated. Reading the room is a bare-minimum skill for any adult, and Mizuno clearly doesn't have it. Got it, you Giants trash? (「虚カス」 — a 5ch insult for Giants fans, swapping 巨人 "giant" for the homophone 虚人 "hollow man")
Probably to make sure that 3rd-rounder signs on a good note. If things stay sour with Oda, even that could get awkward.
Ignorance really is scary.
They burned a precious first-round pick to draft him, so they went in with eyes open — it's within the rules, so it's not really something to criticize. If it fails, they just end up looking foolish, that's all.
You're allowed to say that — if you said the exact same thing back when Sugano and Nagano pulled the same stunt. (Tomoyuki Sugano and Hisayoshi Nagano both refused their original draft teams before eventually joining the Giants)
Sounds like they're setting up a story where 'Coach Matsui' is the one who finally talks the stubbornly absent Oda around.
I'd guess he'd just go through the draft again.
The Giants' negotiating rights run until the end of next March, right? After that, it'd belong to whichever team picks him in a fresh draft.
If he's not signing, not sending him out there is just basic etiquette. A lot of people seem to think 'if he shows up to turn them down in person, people will say he was pressured into it' — showing up at all signals 'there's still a chance.' Not sending the actual decision-maker to a deal that isn't happening is completely standard in business.
Are you seriously saying that about a high schooler?
It's the opposite — they'll have to treat him with extra care to patch things up with Yokohama High.
He actually showed up at the ballpark and everything, so it's not even comparable — turned out completely differently.
And because of that, Sasaki completely disappeared from the scene. Oda's headed the same way.
Yomiuri's power ended the moment Nabetsune and Nagashima passed away. Everyone's on equal footing now.
Still, surely the Giants have the upper hand here.
If the Giants get banned from scouting there, it's the Giants who'll be in trouble.
Would that even happen? If anything, wouldn't he get chewed out with 'go persuade him properly!' instead? It's the Giants we're talking about.
It cuts both ways — the Giants would hate losing the ability to draft out of Yokohama High, and Yokohama High would hate no longer getting drafted by the Giants.
Isn't it a bit early to be trash-talking?
The Giants' first-round pick from the 1972 (Showa 47) draft — the year of the Yuguchi Incident — refused to sign. That's the only case of a refused Giants first-rounder in history. That same year, their 2nd, 4th, and 5th-round picks also turned them down.
If that were the case, they'd have gone way earlier. This whole thing's a staged farce both sides coordinated behind the scenes.
In Japan, amateur baseball actually outranks the pros.
Seriously? The High School Baseball Federation is the strongest?
College and corporate-league ball too. The High School Federation's got nothing to do with it.
Pro and amateur baseball really don't get along. It's a weirdly split setup — two separate pillars for what's supposedly the same sport.
I've heard it's all connected going back to around junior high level, though.
Background and Key Points of the Debate
Under Japan’s draft system, a team is allowed to select a player even after he’s indicated he intends to refuse, and the drafting team’s negotiating rights normally stay in effect until the end of that fiscal year. There’s a real precedent for a refused pick from the 1972 (Showa 47) draft, so forcing through a selection like this isn’t unheard of. The thread split between those who saw it as “not a problem under the rules” and those who felt “ignoring the player’s wishes causes real trouble on the ground” — both sides pointing to a gap between the system’s official rules and how things actually play out. Some commenters brought up Rintaro Sasaki’s earlier refusal as a comparison, but the specifics of each negotiation and each player’s response differ case by case, a nuance that’s hard to capture from the article alone.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Nanimo Jikkyou G) thread “Giants’ courtesy visit to Oda ends in 5 minutes, and Oda doesn’t even show up.”
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