The Hiroshima Carp and Hanshin Tigers will play the first official games at the new Niigata Prefectural Stadium this week with consecutive nighters on July 7 and 8. If ever Japanese baseball was going to expand or a team was to be moved, Niigata would be the next obvious best place in the country to put a pro baseball franchise.
Located on the Japan Sea coast and just a little more than two hours from Tokyo on the Joetsu Shinkansen bullet train line, the city and surrounding area represents an untapped potential fan base waiting to embrace a team, as the city of Sendai and the entire Tohoku region in northeast Honshu welcomed the Rakuten Eagles in 2005.
In fact, during the Japanese baseball crisis of 2004 when the Orix BlueWave and Kintetsu Buffaloes merged and the expansion Rakuten team was established, city officials in Niigata were saying they were hoping to land a Central or Pacific League franchise at some point after the opening of their new stadium — in 2010 or as soon as possible after that.