Professional baseball in Japan the first American to play professional baseball in Japan when he joined the Dai Nippon Tokyo Yakyu Kurabu (Tokyo Giants) in December 1934, touring with them in 1935. Jimmy Bonna, Kiyomi "Slim" Hirakawa, Fumito "Jimmy" Horio, Kazuyoshi "George" Matsuura, Andrew "Bucky" Harris McGalliard (Japan's "Bucky Harris"), Herbert "Buster" North, Yoshio "Sam" Takahashi, and Tadashi "Bozo" Wakabayashi became the first Americans to play in Japan's professional baseball league in 1936. The American writer Robert Whiting wrote in his 1977 book "The Chrysanthemum and the Bat" that, While others have objected to characterizing the sport in these terms, many Japanese players and
Jennifer Welter woman to coach in a men's professional football league. A year prior, the , Welter was signed by the Revolution as a running back. This made her the second female player for a position other than kicker or placekick-holder on a men's professional football team, and the first at running back. She is not the first female to play a male dominant sport; however, she is the second woman after hockey player Hayley Wickenheiser to play a "contact" position in a male dominant sport and the first woman in football to do so. Welter was featured in Mogul's #IAmAMogul campaign