Is it possible to watch Japanese baseball in the United States?

[bosrs1]

As the thread title asks... is it possible to watch the Nippon Professional Baseball league here in the US (online seeming most likely since it's not broadcast on TV). I've been a fan of the Yomiuri Giants for years but have never been able to see them other than the rare times they play an MLB team.

[pmoehrin]

I'd check out sites like Justin.tv

Its possible but you will have to dig a little.

They've been trying to televise games over in the states, but the MLB has been fighting it for years. I think eventually you'll start to see Japanese games televised in the US, but right now the leagues don't see eye to eye as much as most people would think.

[infrared41]

I'd check out sites like Justin.tv

Its possible but you will have to dig a little.

They've been trying to televise games over in the states, but the MLB has been fighting it for years. I think eventually you'll start to see Japanese games televised in the US, but right now the leagues don't see eye to eye as much as most people would think.

That just seems silly to me. I think MLB Network should be the ones to air Japanese baseball. It's a perfect fit.

[pmoehrin]

I'd check out sites like Justin.tv

Its possible but you will have to dig a little.

They've been trying to televise games over in the states, but the MLB has been fighting it for years. I think eventually you'll start to see Japanese games televised in the US, but right now the leagues don't see eye to eye as much as most people would think.

That just seems silly to me. I think MLB Network should be the ones to air Japanese baseball. It's a perfect fit.

Any company that says they welcome competition is completely full of it. Companies fight competition all the time. MLB probably isn't happy that ESPN airs the little league world series. It means more time and money spent on that baseball then MLB baseball.

If people were to start watching the Japanese leagues, even a bit, it means lost revenue for the MLB because entertainment dollars are generally fixed. More money spent on Japanese baseball means less spent on American baseball and vice versa.

We would also be talking about a very niche market here, so it may not be worth it for them to pay the MLB money to air their games in the US, which I don't think they should have to anyway.

[mjrbaseball]

Does NPB webcast any of its games?

[johnwallaceone]

Japanese baseball is available on One World Sport which carried by Dish Network, Cablevision, Verizon and others. You can watch One World on a Roku player by subscribing to DishWorld (no satellite dish or contract needed.)

[HedleyLamarr]

I'd check out sites like Justin.tv

Its possible but you will have to dig a little.

They've been trying to televise games over in the states, but the MLB has been fighting it for years. I think eventually you'll start to see Japanese games televised in the US, but right now the leagues don't see eye to eye as much as most people would think.

That just seems silly to me. I think MLB Network should be the ones to air Japanese baseball. It's a perfect fit.

Any company that says they welcome competition is completely full of it. Companies fight competition all the time. MLB probably isn't happy that ESPN airs the little league world series. It means more time and money spent on that baseball then MLB baseball.

If people were to start watching the Japanese leagues, even a bit, it means lost revenue for the MLB because entertainment dollars are generally fixed. More money spent on Japanese baseball means less spent on American baseball and vice versa.

We would also be talking about a very niche market here, so it may not be worth it for them to pay the MLB money to air their games in the US, which I don't think they should have to anyway.

Even though Japanese baseball is viewed as the vast inferior product, they are a rival league to MLB. Why would they want to show their competition on their own network?

[OMMF]

I'd check out sites like Justin.tv

Its possible but you will have to dig a little.

They've been trying to televise games over in the states, but the MLB has been fighting it for years. I think eventually you'll start to see Japanese games televised in the US, but right now the leagues don't see eye to eye as much as most people would think.

That just seems silly to me. I think MLB Network should be the ones to air Japanese baseball. It's a perfect fit.

Any company that says they welcome competition is completely full of it. Companies fight competition all the time. MLB probably isn't happy that ESPN airs the little league world series. It means more time and money spent on that baseball then MLB baseball.

If people were to start watching the Japanese leagues, even a bit, it means lost revenue for the MLB because entertainment dollars are generally fixed. More money spent on Japanese baseball means less spent on American baseball and vice versa.

We would also be talking about a very niche market here, so it may not be worth it for them to pay the MLB money to air their games in the US, which I don't think they should have to anyway.

Even though Japanese baseball is viewed as the vast inferior product, they are a rival league to MLB. Why would they want to show their competition on their own network?

Same reason the CFL is on NFL Network, they want to be known as the place to turn for coverage of the sport.

[Cosmic]

I'd check out sites like Justin.tv

Its possible but you will have to dig a little.

They've been trying to televise games over in the states, but the MLB has been fighting it for years. I think eventually you'll start to see Japanese games televised in the US, but right now the leagues don't see eye to eye as much as most people would think.

That just seems silly to me. I think MLB Network should be the ones to air Japanese baseball. It's a perfect fit.

Any company that says they welcome competition is completely full of it. Companies fight competition all the time. MLB probably isn't happy that ESPN airs the little league world series. It means more time and money spent on that baseball then MLB baseball.

If people were to start watching the Japanese leagues, even a bit, it means lost revenue for the MLB because entertainment dollars are generally fixed. More money spent on Japanese baseball means less spent on American baseball and vice versa.

We would also be talking about a very niche market here, so it may not be worth it for them to pay the MLB money to air their games in the US, which I don't think they should have to anyway.

Even though Japanese baseball is viewed as the vast inferior product, they are a rival league to MLB. Why would they want to show their competition on their own network?

Same reason the CFL is on NFL Network, they want to be known as the place to turn for coverage of the sport.

If my math is right, the NFL has 256 regular season games and MLB has 2,430. Think about that. Even with how much the NFL loves to talk about every minute detail, that's a lot more time to fill. NFL Network can air regular season CFL games in June, July and August. They air CFL games on Friday night during the fall when the NFL has nothing going on. The NFL is still dormant four nights per week. If you divide up 2,430 MLB games evenly over 180 days, that's 13.5 games every single day of the week with no All-Star break. Additionally, MLB and Japanese baseball play during almost the exact same season (Wikipedia says Japan plays from late March/early April to October). There is no day of the week nor time of the year with live Japanese baseball where there aren't MLB games that you "should" be paying attention to.

[Muggens]

Isn't it difficult to get authentic Japanese league ballcaps as well?

[OMMF]

I'd check out sites like Justin.tv

Its possible but you will have to dig a little.

They've been trying to televise games over in the states, but the MLB has been fighting it for years. I think eventually you'll start to see Japanese games televised in the US, but right now the leagues don't see eye to eye as much as most people would think.

That just seems silly to me. I think MLB Network should be the ones to air Japanese baseball. It's a perfect fit.

Any company that says they welcome competition is completely full of it. Companies fight competition all the time. MLB probably isn't happy that ESPN airs the little league world series. It means more time and money spent on that baseball then MLB baseball.

If people were to start watching the Japanese leagues, even a bit, it means lost revenue for the MLB because entertainment dollars are generally fixed. More money spent on Japanese baseball means less spent on American baseball and vice versa.

We would also be talking about a very niche market here, so it may not be worth it for them to pay the MLB money to air their games in the US, which I don't think they should have to anyway.

Even though Japanese baseball is viewed as the vast inferior product, they are a rival league to MLB. Why would they want to show their competition on their own network?

Same reason the CFL is on NFL Network, they want to be known as the place to turn for coverage of the sport.

If my math is right, the NFL has 256 regular season games and MLB has 2,430. Think about that. Even with how much the NFL loves to talk about every minute detail, that's a lot more time to fill. NFL Network can air regular season CFL games in June, July and August. They air CFL games on Friday night during the fall when the NFL has nothing going on. The NFL is still dormant four nights per week. If you divide up 2,430 MLB games evenly over 180 days, that's 13.5 games every single day of the week with no All-Star break. Additionally, MLB and Japanese baseball play during almost the exact same season (Wikipedia says Japan plays from late March/early April to October). There is no day of the week nor time of the year with live Japanese baseball where there aren't MLB games that you "should" be paying attention to.

But there is no time of day that they are playing at the same time. It would be anywhere between 1am to 5am Eastern time to show a game.

I'm not saying they should, the question was why would they. If they wanted to build the network as the only place to turn for baseball-related programming, that would be a good reason. It's certainly not worse than showing Baseketball like they did a week or two ago.

[tp49]

Isn't it difficult to get authentic Japanese league ballcaps as well?

If by difficult you mean damn near impossible then yes.

[tp49]

I've been looking for an authentic Yomiuri Giants hat for the past six or years or so. I travel frequently to Asia but strangely enough never to Japan so I haven't been able to do the obvious and go to the team store to get one. The Giants' team store will not ship to the US or to any other country outside Japan (tried to have them ship to a friend in Taiwan, one in Thailand and to me when I lived in China). Retailers in the Asian countries I've visited sell MLB caps but not NPB caps. My wife picked up a nice adjustable but I still want my authentic. Guess I'll be checking Rakuten or scheduling a long layover in Tokyo.

[raysox]

I thought this the other day, but I couldn't find anything to watch the NPL online.

However, this youtube channel shows live Korean games, and I thought it was worth posting.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtm_QoN2SIxwCE-59shX7Qg

[cmm]

The Pacific League (one of the two Japanese major leagues) has an MLB.tv-like service. But it isn't free and you'll probably need a friend who can read Japanese to sign up.

http://tv.pacificleague.jp/