Baseball: Oh to quit as Softbank Hawks manager

FUKUOKA, Sept. 23 Kyodo - Softbank Hawks manager Sadaharu Oh said Tuesday he will leave his post for health reasons after 14 seasons at the helm of the Pacific League club.
Oh, 68, the all-time home run king in Japanese baseball, has decided to bring
an end to his long, illustrious career as a player and manager two years after
being diagnosed with cancer and having had his stomach removed.
''I've been in pro baseball for 50 years and it's really been a happy life for
me,'' Oh said in a press conference held at a Fukuoka hotel after Softbank's
game with the Nippon Ham Fighters. ''I'm officially announcing that I'm leaving
and it makes me feel relieved.''
''I used to be confident about my health but there were times that I was
frustrated the last two years,'' he said. ''The owner (Masayoshi Son) said he
cannot persuade me to stay if it's concerned with my health and how my team
performed this season is a different matter.''
''I love baseball and once thought that I would be content with dying in a
baseball uniform on the field. But I lost weight after the surgery and
sometimes it felt as if my legs were not mine.''
After the surgery he underwent in July 2006, Oh returned to Softbank as skipper
at the beginning of the 2007 season and the Hawks finished third in the league.
This year, the Hawks faded badly as the regular season drew to a close, having
lost 15 of the 18 games they played in September and dropped out of the picture
for the three-team postseason playoffs.
In August, he missed one game after he suffered eating complications while
having lunch prior to a game.
Oh, who is eighth on the all-time list with 1,312 career wins as manager, said
he has yet to decide on future plans and will ''take things easy for a while.''
A legendary player who had the whole of his 22-year playing career with the
Yomiuri Giants, for whom he hit 868 homers, Oh had a five-year stint as manager
of the Central League club before becoming Hawks manager in 1995 and guiding
them to three league pennants and two Japan Series crowns.
The Hawks also missed out on a league championship in 2004 and 2005 in the
postseason playoffs despite finishing the regular season in first place.
While in charge of the Hawks, Oh was named Japan's national manager for the
World Baseball Classic held in March 2006 and guided his team to the inaugural
title of the tournament, which featured major league players representing their
countries for the first time ever.
In his playing career that began in 1959, Oh developed his distinctive
flamingo-style batting stance and etched his name in the record books.
Oh won 15 home run and 13 RBI titles while leading the league in batting
average five times. He became the triple crown winner by topping the three
major batting categories in 1973 and 1974.
A 20-time All-Star first baseman, Oh was also named the league's Most Valuable
Player nine times and helped the Giants claim a record nine straight league and
Japan Series titles between 1965 and 1973 in the center of the lineup alongside
another baseball icon Shigeo Nagashima.
Another career highlight came in 1977 when he hit his 756th career homer to
surpass the major league record held by Hank Aaron. The feat made him the first
recipient of the People's Honor Award.
Along with his record home run tally, Oh had a .301 batting average and drove
in 2,170 runs. In 1994, he was inducted into the Japanese baseball Hall of
Fame.