Masanori Taguchi

Masanori Taguchi (田口 昌徳)

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 5' 10", Weight 202 lb.

• School Komazawa University
• High School Fujishiro Shisui High School

• Born August 26, 1970 in Hitachiomiya, Ibaraki Japan

BR register page

Biographical Information

Masanori Taguchi played in Nippon Pro Baseball for 12 years.

Taguchi crushed 8 homers with a .285 batting average in his college career, and he won two Best Nine awards. He was drafted by the Nippon Ham Fighters in the 4th round of the 1992 NPB draft, but he spent his first season in the NPB Farm Leagues. He went 7-for-44 in 1994, and he got some chances at catcher when Fujio Tamura left the team in 1995. Taguchi hit .200/.255/.305 in 82 games that season, and he had a .210/.280/.304 batting line in 1996 while leading the Pacific League with 11 hit-by-pitches. Taguchi struggled again in 1997 as his batting line was .197/.251/.287 in 81 games.

When Toshihiro Noguchi joined the team in 1998, Taguchi lost his spot and he played 60 games with a .203/.260/.246 batting line. He only got 17 hits in 114 at-bats combined in the next three seasons, and the Fighters traded him to the Softbank Hawks for Takaya Hayashi. Taguchi hit .230/.287/.310 in 35 games in 2002, and he was 2-for-10 in 2003. He went 15-for-67 in 2004, but he was 2-for-10 again in 2005 and he announced his retirement. Taguchi was the minor league battery coach for the Hawks from 2009 to 2010, and he scouted for them from 2011 to 2013. The Rakuten Golden Eagles named him their battery coach in 2015, and he was the battery coach for the Seibu Lions in 2016 and for the Chiba Lotte Marines in 2017. Taguchi was an assistant coach for Seinan Gakuin University in 2019, and he moved to International Pacific University as assistant coach in 2020.

Overall, Taguchi hit .199/.259/.282 with 224 hits and 18 homers in 12 seasons in NPB.

Sources

• Wiki Japan