On 11 March, the opening match between Fukuoka Softbank and The Giants at Nagasaki Big N Stadium ended in a 4-4 draw.

​Fukuoka Softbank starter Jun Maeda pitcher started the first inning with a three-way tie. In the top of the fourth, he had runners on first and second with no outs, but he was able to break the deadlock and closer the fifth inning with runner runners on and no hit in the sixth, Walk 3 strike out runs.

With one out in the bottom of the third inning, Ryuta Hirose hit a doble single, followed by an RBI single by Downs. With two outs and the bases loaded, Tomoya Masaki added one more run on an RBI triple. With no outs in the bottom of the fourth, Kenta Tanigawara sacrifice fly from third base and an RBI single by Akira Nakamura in the bottom of the fifth gave the Yankees a four-run lead.

But in the top of the seventh, Haruhiro Hamaguchi pitcher, who was on second, pinch-hit with two outs and a runner on first and second with Walk and hit on base, gave up one run on an RBI doble. In addition, Fumimaru Taura pitcher scored two runs on a wild pitch from third base with one out. Shunsuke Iwasaki pitcher, who moved up to mound instead, tied the game with an RBI single with two outs and bases loaded.

​Ryo Oyama pitcher, the No. 4 hitter, got out of the top of the ninth inning with one out and the bases loaded with no runs, but the bottom of the ninth inning was scoreless to end the game at 4-4. In the batting order with 12 hit, Downes had 2 hit 1 RBI and Tomoya Inoue 3 hit.

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Giant: Atsushi Inoue - Kaori Toda - Sosuke Baba - Daisuke Kondo - Ryuta Hirauchi - Kenshin Hotta
Jun Jun Maeda-Haruhiro Hamaguchi-Fumimaru Taura-Shunsuke Iwasaki-Ryo Oyama

Text by Aoi Nemoto