Nippon Professional Baseball merged with the Orix BlueWave and were replaced by the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles. Until 1993, baseball was the only team sport played professionally in Japan. In that year, the J.League professional soccer league was founded. The new soccer league placed teams in prefectural capitals around the country—rather than clustering them in and around Tokyo—and the teams were named after their locations rather than after corporate sponsors. The wave of players moving to Major League Baseball, which began with Hideo Nomo "retiring" from the Kintetsu Buffaloes, then signing with the Los Angeles Dodgers, has also added to the financial problems.
Shigetoshi Hasegawa pitcher in Major League Baseball ahead of Hideo Nomo. Hasegawa was known for releasing the ball very quickly, throwing off the batter's timing. He was very durable, spending time on the disabled list only once in nine years in the majors. Hasegawa explained that he did not move to the U.S. to play in the majors; he entered the majors because he wanted to live in the U.S. He has since obtained permanent residence in the U.S. He speaks fluent English, even interviewing teammates on an American television show, and he introduced himself in English at his first press conference