Japan’s professional baseball, which won the World Baseball Classic (WBC) last month and became the world’s top baseball player, also recorded the highest average annual salary for its players this year.
On the 24th, the Japan Professional Baseball Players Association announced the results of an annual salary survey conducted on 714 registered players from 12 teams, excluding some foreign players this year. The total annual salary was 31.9 billion 1.28 million yen (approximately 317.5 billion 3.86 million won), and the average was 44.68 million yen (approximately 443 million won), all of which broke the previous record.
Among the 12 clubs, Yomiuri had the highest average salary. Yomiuri recaptured the top annual salary in four years with 68.07 million yen (approximately 680 million won). The lowest ranked Nippon Ham was 25.69 million yen (approximately 255.68 million won), with a difference of 42.38 million yen (approximately 421.79 million won) from the first place. Softbank, which ranked first for the last three years in a row, was pushed to second place with 67.63 million yen (approximately 673.1 million won).메이저놀이터
Looking at each position, Softbank offered the highest annual salary at 67.26 million yen (approximately 669.41 million won) for pitchers. Orix, who won the Japan Series with a strong bullpen last season, earned the second lowest amount of 29.54 million yen (approximately 293.98 million won). For the catcher, Orix won 86.33 million yen (approximately 859.15 million won), and for the infielder Yomiuri ranked first with 86.84 million yen (approximately 864.23 million won). As for the outfielder, Softbank, which brought Kensuke Kondo as a free agent (FA) this year, paid an average of 113.6 million yen (approximately 1.13 billion won), taking the unrivaled first place.
Although major players such as Masataka Yoshida (Boston Red Sox) and Kodai Senga (New York Mets) advanced to the major leagues and were excluded from the total salary data, player salaries continued to increase. Japan’s Mainichi Shimbun said, “In the Central League, player salaries increased by 11.7% compared to the previous year, but in the Pacific League, Yoshida and Senga decreased by 3.5% due to the transfer of players. It has been four years since the Central League has outpaced the Pacific League.”
It was about three times the average annual salary in the KBO league. Last month, the KBO announced, “The average annual salary of 506 players from 10 clubs, excluding rookies and foreign players, was tallied at 146.48 million won.”