Famous People in Japan



Kuriyama Hideki

Date of Birth 26 April 1961
Place of Birth Tokyo

You can see Kuriyama Hideki as a newscaster in a TV program named "Sports and News (TBS)" every Sunday evening these days, but he had been a professional baseball player before that.

He had been a baseball player since he was a child. He was active in New Tokyo Universities League as a pitcher when he was in Tokyo Gakugei University; following are his university days' results: batting average: .395 pithing results: 25 wins and 8 loses

In 1984 he joined the Yakult Swallows, a professional baseball team, by passing the entrance physical test, and he attracted many peoples' attention with his career since he was from a national university, and was the only professional baseball player with a teacher's license.

The first thing what he did was to convert to an outfielder being relied upon for his throwing ability. He took place in the professional league game on October 8th, 1984, the one against Taiyo Whales ( the present: Bay Stars) for the first time, and he got the first hit on August 1st 1985.

Unfortunately, he had to enter the hospital, suffering from Meniere's disease in 1987. After his comeback, he became a regular player at last with great effort to be a switch hitter, and in 1992 he won the Golden Glove Prize what he had been anxious to do for a long time. In 1993, however, he retired because the disease prevented him from playing.

His second life started with being a reporter of sports in a TV program "News Station (TV Asahi)" and commentator of baseball games. Making good use his academic career, he once used to be a lecturer in Toho-Gakuen University,and published some books of his essay such as "Yume o oikakete (Chasing Dreams)."

References: Gendai Nihonjinmeiroku, 1994

Reported by: Yumi Okuno
Data verified by: Kaori Nagato
Date of Report: November 1995

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