Eastern League (Japanese baseball) Eastern League (Japanese baseball) The is one of the two minor leagues ("ni-gun") of Japanese professional baseball. The league is owned and managed by the Central League of Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). Teams in the Eastern League generally play an 80-game schedule every year. In 1954 the six teams of NPB's Central League agreed to form their own minor league — the Shin Nippon League (or "New Japan League") — as a complement to the already extant Kansai Farm League, which had begun play in 1952. The minor league affiliates of the Chunichi Dragons and Hanshin Tigers moved over from
Chico Outlaws in major league history in hit a grand slam in his first at bat as he went deep to centerfield on the first pitch thrown to him. On June 1, 2010, Eri Yoshida, a 5 foot, 1 inch female knuckleball pitcher from Japan, pitched for the Outlaws. The Outlaws made history and defied the odds to sweep the Calgary Vipers to win the GBL North Division Title, then sweep Na Koa Ikaika Maui to capture their second GBL Championship in 2010, becoming the first team in league history to accomplish that feat, as well as going undefeated in the playoffs.