Hanshin Tigers

The Hanshin Tigers are a Nippon Professional Baseball team playing in the Central League. The team is based in Nishinomiya, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan, next to their main stadium, Hanshin Koshien Stadium.
The Tigers are owned by Hanshin Electric Railway Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Hankyu Hanshin Holdings Inc.
The Hanshin Tigers are one of the oldest professional clubs in Japan. They played their first season in 1936 as the Osaka Tigers and assumed their current team name in 1961.

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History

The Hanshin Tigers, the second-oldest professional club in Japan, were founded on December 10, 1935, with the team being formed in 1936. The team was first called Ōsaka Tigers. In 1940, amid anti-foreign sentiment and the Tojo government's ban on English nicknames, the Tigers changed the name to simply Hanshin. In 1947, the team reverted to Ōsaka Tigers after the JPBL permitted use of English nicknames. The current team name was assumed in 1961 due to the team playing in the suburb of Nishinomiya, which is not in Osaka Prefecture.
The Tigers won four titles before the establishment of the two-league system in 1950. Since the league was split into the Central League and Pacific League, the Tigers have won the Central League pennant seven times and Japan Series twice.
When the 2004 Major League Baseball season began in Japan, the Tigers played an exhibition game against the New York Yankees at the Tokyo Dome on March 29. The Tigers won 11–7.
The 2025 [Major League Baseball season] kicked off with two games at the Tokyo Dome between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Chicago Cubs. Prior to the series, the Tigers played exhibition games against each of these major league clubs, winning both on consecutive shutouts.
In 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2009, more than three million people attended games hosted by the Tigers, the only one of the 12 Nippon Professional Baseball teams to achieve this. In 2011, the Hanshin Tigers drew an average home attendance of 40,256.
The home field, Koshien Stadium, is used by high school baseball teams from all over Japan for the national championship tournaments in spring and summer. The summer tournament takes place in the middle of the Tigers' season, forcing the Tigers to go on a road trip and play their home games at Kyocera Dome Osaka. Fans call this "The Road of Death".
Famous players in Hanshin Tigers history include Fumio Fujimura, Masaru Kageura, Minoru Murayama, Yutaka Enatsu, Masayuki Kakefu, Randy Bass, Taira Fujita, and many others.

Koshien Stadium

The home field of the Tigers, Hanshin Koshien Stadium, is one of three major natural grass baseball stadiums in Japan. The others are the Mazda Zoom-Zoom Stadium Hiroshima, and Hotto Motto Field Kobe. Of the three, only Koshien has an all-dirt infield
Koshien Stadium is the oldest ballpark in Japan; built in 1924, the stadium was once visited by American baseball legend Babe Ruth on a tour of Major League stars in 1934. There is a monument commemorating this visit within the stadium grounds, in an area called Mizuno Square.

Curse of the Colonel

As with many other underachieving baseball teams, a curse was believed to lurk over the Tigers. In 1985, when the Tigers had just clinched the Central League pennant, fans celebrated by having people who looked like Tigers players jump into the Dōtonbori Canal. According to legend, because none of the fans resembled first baseman Randy Bass, fans grabbed a life-sized statue of the KFC mascot, Colonel Sanders, and threw it into the river. After this the Tigers managed to defeat the Seibu Lions in the 1985 Japan Series four games to three. After many seasons after the incident without a pennant win, the Tigers were said to be doomed never to win the season again until the Colonel was rescued from the river.
In 2003, when the Tigers returned to the Japan Series after 18 years with the best record in the Central League, many KFC outlets in Kōbe and Ōsaka moved their Colonel Sanders statues inside until the series was over to protect the statues from Tigers fans.
In 2005, like 2003, they clinched the pennant and made it back to the Japan Series, but lost to Bobby Valentine's Chiba Lotte Marines. They were outscored 33–4 in four games.
The top half of the Colonel Sanders statue was finally recovered on March 10, 2009, and the bottom half and right hand shortly after, in the canal by construction workers while constructing a new boardwalk area as part of a beautification project. The statue is still missing its left hand and glasses. The KFC outlet where this statue once stood has since closed; the statue is now at the KFC headquarters in Yokohama. It is not viewable by the public. Since then, the Hanshin Tigers made the 2014 Japan Series, but lost to the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks in 5 games. The curse was finally broken, after the Hanshin Tigers managed to defeat the rival Orix Buffaloes in the 2023 Japan Series four games to three.

Fandom

Tigers fans are known as perhaps the most fanatical and dedicated fans in all of Japanese professional baseball. They often outnumber the home team fans at Tigers "away" games. Tigers fans also once had a reputation for rough behavior and a willingness to brawl with other fans or with each other, although fights are rare these days.
A famous Tigers fan tradition is the release, by the fans, of hundreds of air-filled balloons immediately following the seventh-inning stretch and the singing of the Tigers' fight song. This tradition is carried out at all home and away games, except at games against the Yomiuri Giants in the Tokyo Dome due to the Giants' notoriously authoritarian and heavy-handed rules for controlling behavior by visiting fans.
The Tigers-Giants rivalry is considered the national Japanese rivalry, on par with the Dodgers-Giants and Yankees-Red Sox rivalries in Major League Baseball or El Clásico in Spanish football. The two teams have historically had a relatively close record of games with the Giants taking 1127 wins over the Tigers whereas the Tigers have taken 888 games over the Giants. 77 of the total games between the two have ended in tie.

Fight song

"The Hanshin Tigers' Song", as known as "Rokko Oroshi", lyrics by Sonosuke Sato and composed by Yuji Koseki, is a popular song in the Kansai area. It is the official fight song of the Tigers. In Japan, wind which blows down from a mountain is known to be cold and harsh, hence the song symbolizes the Tiger's brave challenge under hardship. The song can be found on karaoke boxes.

Japanese	Romaji	English
	Rokkō oroshi ni sassō to Sōten kakeru nichirin no Seishun no haki uruwashiku Kagayaku wagana zo Hanshin Tigers Ō-ō-ō-ō Hanshin Tigers Fure-fure-fure-fure Tōshi hatsuratsu tatsu ya ima Nekketsu sude ni teki o tsuku Jūō no iki takaraka ni Muteki no warera zo Hanshin Tigers Ō-ō-ō-ō Hanshin Tigers Fure-fure-fure-fure Tetsuwan kyōda ikuchitabi Kitaete koko ni Kōshien Shōri ni moyuru eikan wa Kagayaku warera zo Hanshin Tigers Ō-ō-ō-ō Hanshin Tigers Fure-fure-fure-fure	an official English version, not a direct translation Dashing swiftly through the wind blowin' from Rokko Like the big sun soaring in the clear blue sky Mighty spirit of the youth shows the victor's grace The name that shines in glory "Hanshin Tigers" Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Hanshin Tigers Go, Go, Go, Go! Powerful hits and skillful pitch achieved a thousand times Trained with every discipline here at Koshien Crowned with constant victory glorious, matchless feat Always proud, invincible "Hanshin Tigers" Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Hanshin Tigers Go, Go, Go, Go!

Regular season records

Season	GP	W	L	T	%	GB	Finish	Playoffs
2016	143	64	76	3	.457	24.5	4th, Central	-
2017	143	78	61	4	.561	10	2nd, Central	Lost Climax Series First Stage, 1–2
2018	143	62	79	2	.440	20	6th, Central	Did not qualify
2019	143	69	68	6	.504	6	3rd, Central	Lost Climax Series Final Stage, 1–4
2020	120	60	53	7	.531	7.5	2nd, Central	Did not qualify
2021	143	77	56	10	.579	1	2nd, Central	Lost Climax Series First Stage, 0–2
2022	143	68	71	10	.579	12	3rd, Central	Lost Climax Series Final Stage, 0–4
2023	143	85	53	5	.616	—	1st, Central	Won Japan Series, 4–3
2024	143	74	63	6	.540	3.5	2nd, Central	Lost Climax Series First Stage, 0–2
2025	143	85	54	4	.612	—	1st, Central	Lost Japan Series, 1–4

Players of note

Former players

– IF
– OF

MLB players

Media relating to the Tigers

Mascots

To Lucky is a mascot character of the Tigers. With his girlfriend Lucky, he entertains spectators at team games. His uniform number is 1985, because his first appearance was in 1985. His name is a combination of two separate Japanese words,, meaning tiger and meaning lucky. His name therefore means "lucky tiger" in Japanese.
To Lucky's first appearance was on the screen at Hanshin Koshien Stadium in 1985. He appeared as a live-action character in 1987. His design was updated in 1992.
Aside from To Lucky, the other mascots of the Tigers are Lucky, his girlfriend, and the most recent addition, Keeta, Lucky's little brother. Keeta's uniform number is 2011, because he was introduced to the Tigers in 2011. He wears a backwards cap. Lucky's cap is pink unlike her boyfriend's and his little brother's.

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