Japanese National Baseball and Softball Teams were among the nation's athletes recognised and awarded by the Japan Sports Agency for their outstanding performances in 2019.
The Samurai Japan squad won the top international baseball competition of 2019, the II WBSC Premier12, while Japanese National Softball Teams won the WBSC U-18 Softball World Cup 2020 and placed second at the WBSC Men’s Softball World Championship 2019.
Japan's Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology praised the nation's athletes and their coaches who achieved excellent results in 2019.
The 29 Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) players and 6 members of the coaching staff of the Samurai Japan National Team (see full roster) that won the WBSC Premier12 2019 were recognised by the Japan Sports Agency.
The 17 athletes and 3 officials of the 2019 Japanese Men's National Team, and the 16 players and 3 officials from the U-18 Softball World Cup squad were also among the 500 recipients of this recognition.
The purpose of the award is to commend those who have achieved particularly excellent results in world-class sports competitions.
