One of the oldest Pacific League teams, the Fukuoka Daiei Hawks are a confusing ball club. A strong team for their first four decades, the Hawks have had one winning season in the last twenty years. Because Daiei has some of the best hitters in the league, critics keep predicting a pennant for the team.

In an attempt to blast their way to first place, the Hawks have begun to resemble the Colorado Rockies. Playing in the immense Fukuoka Dome, Daiei features a line-up of sluggers who can hit home runs anywhere. But since the Hawks have the worst pitching staff in Japan, their only chance of capturing a pennant is to score ten runs every game.

Bringing his power-hitting philosophy to the Hawks, home run-king and Daiei manager Sadaharu Oh can't figure out how to help the Hawks soar above the .500 mark. Though the team has one genuine pitching star, Kimiyasu Kudo (144-78, 1755 strikeouts, 3.23 career ERA), Oh has no idea how to build an effective mound staff around him. Daiei's priority is clearly with batting.

In the last two years, the Hawks first signed 1996 Olympics slugger Tadahito Iguchi then two-time Central League RBI king Luis Lopez. Along with aging center fielder Koji Akiyama (394 career home runs), the Hawks enlist DH Koichiro Yoshinaga (.300, 29 home runs, 73 RBIs in 1997), catcher Kenji Jojima (.308, 15, 68) and second baseman Hiroki Kokubo (.302, 36, 114). Because of his active participation in a tax evasion conspiracy, Kokubo will likely be suspended for part of the season.

Founded in 1938, the Hawks played poorly during the war years, but when manager Kazuto Tsuruoka took over as skipper, he led the team to either a first or second-place finish every year from 1950-66. During the last half of Tsuruoka's tenure, catcher Katsuya Nomura became the team leader, eventually belting 657 home runs. Nomura later managed the Hawks during the 1970s, but after he was fired, the team posted sixteen straight losing seasons even while slugger Hiromitsu Kadota compiled 567 career home runs.

In 1988, the Daiei supermarket chain bought the Hawks and moved them to Kyushu, Japan's southern island. When the Fukuoka Dome opened in 1993, the Hawks moved into their new home.

With a relatively new ballpark modeled after Toronto's SkyDome, the Hawks have a loyal following and in 1996 they had the second highest attendance of any Japanese team. While the Fukuoka Dome offers Japan's only removable lid, the playing field and high walls around the field move fans far away from the action.

Even if the sight-lines are miserable, the ballpark offers several bars and restaurants with a birds-eye view of the field. The team's mascot, Harry the Hawk, loiters around foul territory at home games.