One of the oldest teams in Japan, the Hanshin Tigers have for six decades represented Osaka in that city's rivalry with Tokyo. Like politics and economics, Osaka's baseball has never been much of a match.

Founded in 1936, the Tigers started out as one of the strongest teams in Japan, second only to the Tokyo Kyojin (Yomiuri Giants). Prior to the establishment of the two league system in 1950, the Tigers had already compiled a franchise 730-472 record with four league titles.

Throughout the 1950s, with the Giants racking up pennant after pennant, Hanshin earned six second place finishes. Led by third baseman Fumio Fujimura, the Tigers featured one of the best offenses of the era. For his part, Fujimura earned the 1950 CL batting crown with a .362 average and in 1953 led the league 27 home runs and 98 RBIs.

While Hanshin's pitching in those early years was pretty good, it got much better entering the 1960s. Already leading the team's mound staff, Masaaki Koyama earned 176 wins for the Tigers from 1952-63. With the addition of Minoru Murayama in 1959, Gene Bacque (1962) and Yutaka Enatsu (1967), the Tigers built the best CL pitching staff of the 1960s.

In 1962, Hanshin compiled a team 2.03 ERA while Koyama earned the Sawamura Award with a 27-11 record, 270 strikeouts and a 1.66 ERA. Murayama, who had already won his first Sawamura Award in his rookie debut, backed up Koyama with a 1.20 ERA and 265 strikeouts. Together, the two hurlers pitched roughly 700 innings.

Even though Hanshin's batters compiled a mediocre .223 team batting average with 64 home runs that year, their pitching was good enough to earn the Tigers a 75-55 record and their first Central League pennant. Facing the Toei Flyers in the Japan Series, Hanshin won the first two matches and tied the third but lost the next four straight games by close margins.

After the team placed third in 1963, Koyama signed a deal with the Flyers, leaving the pitching burden on Murayama and Bacque. In his first two seasons, the American pitcher performed moderately well, but there was little indication that he could fill Koyama's shoes.

But in 1964 Bacque pitched the best season of his life, striking out 200 batters while leading the league with a 1.89 ERA and a 29-9 record. Receiving the Sawamura Award, the right-handed hurler led the Tigers to a team 2.75 ERA. Finally offering some run support, Tigers' batters hit .240 with 114 home runs, enough to propel the team to first place with an 80-56 record. Losing the Japan Series to the Nankai Hawks in seven games, Hanshin would have to wait twenty-one years for their next shot at a championship.

Until the mid-1970s, pitching remained Hanshin's strength. Earning two straight Sawamura Awards in 1965 and '66, Murayama established himself as one of the Central League's most dominant pitchers and in 1970 the veteran right-hander posted a CL record 0.98 ERA. Though Bacque left the Tigers in 1968, Yutaka Enatsu led the CL with 25 wins that year while striking out a record 401 batters to win the Sawamura Award. But after Murayama retired in 1972 and Enatsu became a free agent and left the team in 1975, Hanshin's pitching grew worse.

By 1978, Hanshin's pitching staff compiled a 4.79 ERA, the worst worst in mark in team history, and the team dropped to sixth place with a 41-80 record. Panic prompted the Tigers' front office to sign Don Blasingame to manage the team. Though he led the team to a much improved 61-60 record in 1979, the following year the American skipper found himself mired in controversy. Refusing to play popular but green draft pick Akinobu Okada, Blasingame ran into trouble with fans and the Hanshin organization.

Dave Hilton, the foreign player who was perceived as blocking Okada from joining the team's infield, began receiving death threats from Tigers fans. Team president Shojiro Ono stepped in and persuaded the skipper to release Hilton and give Okada a chance to play. But when the Tigers acquired new foreign player Bruce Boisclair, Blasingame quit, claiming he had been left out the loop. Though Okada went on to hit 245 home runs for the Osaka team, Hanshin finished the turbulent 1980 season with a fifth place 54-66 record.

At roughly the same time as Hanshin's pitching decayed, the Tigers' offense began improving. While Okada added an extra home run punch to the team, Koichi Tabuchi slugged 320 home runs from 1969-78 and Masayuki Kakefu compiled 349 homers (1974-88). But it wasn't until Randy Bass joined the team in 1983 that Hanshin's offense really exploded.

Moderately successful in his first two seasons, Bass earned his first triple crown in 1985 while batting .350 with 134 RBIs and 54 home runs. Going into the final series of the season against the Yomiuri Giants, then managed by Sadaharu Oh (who held the single-reason record of 55 home runs), Bass saw nothing but balls way out of the strike zone. To protect Oh's record, Yomiuri's pitchers were allegedly told they would be fined if they threw any strikes to Bass.

Becoming a national icon even without the record, Bass helped the Tigers compile 219 home runs and a team .285 batting average. Finishing with a 74-49 record, Hanshin captured their first pennant in decades and went on to defeat the Seibu Lions in six games to earn their first Japan Series championship. Named the series MVP, Bass inspired a wave of Tiger-mania that swept Japan.

Despite earning his second triple crown the following year while batting .389, a single season record, Bass couldn't lift the Tigers beyond third place. When his son became ill early in the 1987 season, he returned to America, prompting many critics to question his devotion to the team.

Eventually released, Bass and the ball club became entangled in a bitter legal battle over who would pay for the child's medical expenses. Meanwhile, without their top slugger, the Tigers went into free-fall, finishing the season with worst franchise record (41-83) and their lowest home run total (82) since 1966. More than just a bad season, 1987 was a preview to how the Tigers would play for the next decade.

While Hanshin's offense made a turn for the worse, the team still got some great performances from their foreign players. One of the first young Americans to use Japan as a stepping stone to the Major Leagues, Cecil Fielder clubbed 38 home runs in 1989 while batting .302. The following year, part-time Major Leaguer Tom O'Malley joined the team, eventually earning the 1993 batting crown with a .329 average.

Throughout the 1990s, the Tigers have remained the Central League's least successful team. Although every year the team talks as if it's going to finally turn things around, their personnel choices often show a lack forethought. The Tigers dumped O'Malley in 1994 after a slight dip in his hitting.

But signing with the Swallows the next year, he earned the MVP with a .302 average and 31 home runs. Picking up Mike Greenwell in 1997, the unreliable slugger arrived in Japan a month after the season began, played one week, broke his foot and promptly retired. But it's possible the Tigers are learning from their mistakes.

After Greenwell called it quits, Hanshin hired former Chunichi Dragon Darnell Coles. Though the third baseman didn't work out, the Tigers haven't given up looking through other teams' scrap yards to find players they can use. Signing former Chunichi batting king Alonzo Powell shortly after the 1997 season, the Tigers tried to pick up released Yakult hurler Terry Bross. When that plan fell through, the team went on a shopping spree picking up several North American minor league players.

Realizing that even the best prospect can fall short of expectations, the Tigers are filling their minor league roster with foreign names, ready to be called up as soon as an opening becomes available. It's probably the safest way for Hanshin to make sure their recent history of personnel problems doesn't repeat itself.