Best Nine Award

The Best Nine Award is an annual Nippon Professional Baseball honor bestowed upon the best players across the Central League and Pacific League at each position during the season. As determined by a pool of journalists, one player from each position, plus one for the designated hitter in the Pacific League since 1975, is selected for the honor. The Central League plans to utilize the designated hitter starting in the 2027 season, which may possibly mean that they may amend the Best Nine Award to accommodate for a best player at the DH position just like the Pacific League does.

History

While the Best Nine Award was first presented to players following the season, it was not until that it became an annual award. After the Japanese Baseball League was divided into Central and Pacific leagues in 1950, the award was presented to nine players from each league. Following the Pacific League's adoption of the DH rule in, ten players have been chosen for the Best Nine Award in the Pacific League alone each year.

Selection process

Journalists vote on the best pitcher, catcher, first baseman, second baseman, third baseman, shortstop, and three outfielders in each of the two leagues. As is the case with the Silver Slugger Award, said to be the Major League equivalent of the award, left fielders, center fielders, and right fielders are not chosen separately.
Voters for the award are chosen from journalists employed by national newspaper, broadcast, or communication outlets with five or more years of experience in covering professional baseball. Each voter selects one player at each position in each league; the player with the most votes at each position receives the Best Nine Award. Until 2004, the winning players of the award were announced two days after the final game of the Japan Series; from 2005 onwards, the winners have been announced at the Professional Baseball Convention, the NPB's annual awards ceremony.
Because of the nature of the voting process, it is possible, although exceedingly rare, that two or more players may end up with the same number of votes at any given position. In 2004, Masahiro Araki of the Chunichi Dragons and Greg LaRocca, then of the Hiroshima Carp, were tied for most votes for the Central League second baseman, the first time a tie had occurred since the current two-league system was adopted.
In addition, it is also possible that a player ends up with the most votes at more than one position in the same season. In, then-Nankai Hawks infielder Yasuhiro Kunisada ended up with the most votes at both second base and third base in the Pacific League. He only received the award at second base, and the award for best third baseman went to Tony Roig of the Nishitetsu Lions. In, Shohei Ohtani of Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters received the awards at pitcher and DH.

Other notes

In the Central League, the pitcher that receives the Best Nine Award is also named the league's Most Valuable Pitcher. This is not the case in the Pacific League, where the pitcher with the highest winning percentage is named the Most Valuable Pitcher.

Key

Year	Links to the corresponding Nippon Professional Baseball season
1B	First baseman
2B	Second baseman
3B	Third baseman
SS	Shortstop
OF	Outfielder
C	Catcher
P	Pitcher
DH	Designated hitter
*	Winner of the most Best Nine Awards at his position
†	Member of the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame

List of Best Nine Award winners

Japanese Baseball League (1940, 1947–1949)

Nippon Professional Baseball (1950–present)

Central League

Pacific League

Best Nine Awards by count

Pink indicate team that no longer exists

Team	League	# of players to win Best Nine
Yomiuri Giants	JBL / Central	213
Saitama Seibu Lions	Pacific	161
Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks	JBL/Pacific	154
Orix Buffaloes	Pacific	130
Hanshin Tigers	JBL / Central	119
Chunichi Dragons	Central	114
Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters	Pacific	106
Chiba Lotte Marines	Pacific	103
Hiroshima Toyo Carp	Central	98
Tokyo Yakult Swallows	Central	93
Yokohama DeNA BayStars	Central	70
Osaka Kintetsu Buffaloes	Pacific	59
Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles	Pacific	26
Lion / Shochiku Robins	JBL / CL	6
Kinsei / Daiei Stars	JBL/PL	5
Tsubasa Baseball Club	JBL	1