The Pacific League Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters will hold their third annual Arizona Diamondbacks Day promotion on Sunday, April 18, at the Tokyo Dome. Diamondbacks Day is held so the Nippon Ham team can honor the National League club (its working partner), and the Fighters ball club is inviting 3,000 foreign fans as guests to this fun international event.
Although the Nippon Ham franchise has moved from Tokyo to Sapporo and become the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters, the F's will still play 14 games (12 as the home team and two as a visitor) at Tokyo Dome in 2004. The April 18 game concludes the first series of the season for the Fighters at the Big Egg.
This will be the earliest date Diamondbacks Day (or its predecessor, Yankees Day) has ever been held, and this year's matchup is especially interesting, because the opposing team will be the Chiba Lotte Marines.