Nine Nippon Ham Fighters, whose home park will host one of this year's two All-Star games, have been selected to the Pacific League team through fan voting, Nippon Professional Baseball announced Tuesday.
Rifle-armed outfielder Chusei Mannami led all players from both leagues with 1,314,833 votes. SoftBank Hawks outfielders Kensuke Kondo and Yuki Yanagita, along with Seibu Lions designated hitter Takeya Nakamura, were the only non-Fighters voted to the PL team.
Game 1 will be at Nippon Ham's ballpark, Es Con Field Hokkaido, just outside Sapporo, on July 23. Game 2 will be July 24 at Tokyo's historic Jingu Stadium, the home park of Yakult Swallows third baseman Munetaka Murakami, whose 969,965 votes led all Central League players.
Winners of the players' vote, to be announced Thursday, will be added to the rosters if fans failed to select them. The two managers will fill out their rosters next Monday, with the exception of one final player for each team to be selected by another fan ballot.
