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.
Sri Lanka national baseball team Sri Lanka national baseball team The Sri Lanka national baseball team is the national baseball team of Sri Lanka. Baseball was introduced to Sri Lanka in the mid 1980s. American Baseball coach Jim Dimick was the first official coach to teach the game to the players. The team represents Sri Lanka in international competitions. Sri Lanka took part in the first ever Asian Baseball Cup, which was held in Philippines in 1995. Twenty four countries belong to the Baseball Federation of Asia. In May 2009, Sri Lanka qualified for the Semi-finals of the Asian Baseball Championship for the first time.