Shohei Ohtani and Yu Darvish grace a mural at Es Con Field Hokkaido, the new home stadium for the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters, which will open next spring in Kita-Hiroshima. Some footage is provided by the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters. (Eiji Noda)

Photo/Illutration Construction of Es Con Field Hokkaido, a new home stadium for the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters, is nearly complete in Kita-Hiroshima. (Kengo Hiyoshi)

Shohei Ohtani and Yu Darvish, two legendary players with the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters, feature largely in the team’s new home stadium, but the ballpark is not ready for show-time just yet.

The nearly-completed Es Con Field Hokkaido in Kita-Hiroshima, Hokkaido, features a wall named “Tower Eleven” that displays a mural of Ohtani and Darvish in their pitching forms.

The two players both wore No. 11 with the Fighters before becoming stars in the major leagues.

The mural, painted in austerely elegant colors by a group of artists known as “OVER ALLs,” is 5.5 meters high and 7 meters wide. It is located in what is expected to be a busy concourse on the first floor of the left field side.

Taro Ogawa of Fighters Sports and Entertainment Co. said the mural represents and respects the two legends who “think outside the box and embody the spirit of innovation and forward-thinking in many forms.”

Es Con Field Hokkaido will be the first baseball stadium in Japan with a retractable roof over natural grass. Kentucky Bluegrass, which is suitable for the cold weather of the northern main island, has been used for the field.

According to project officials, 95 percent of the construction work is already done for the stadium in Kita-Hiroshima, a city outside Sapporo. The work is expected to be completed in March 2023, just ahead of the new baseball season.

But at an executive committee meeting of the 12 teams of Nippon Professional Baseball on Nov. 7, some attendees pointed out that Es Con Field Hokkaido fails to meet one standard defined by official Japanese baseball rules.

Specifically, they noted that the distance from home plate to the back stop at the Fighters’ new stadium is 15 meters.

The Japanese rule, a direct translation of the Major League’s Official Baseball Rules, says the distance should be 60 feet, or about 18 meters.

According to a source, the Fighters have already apologized to other teams about the distance.

But the team has shown no indication that it will change the stadium’s blueprints.

HKS Inc., a U.S. design firm that is building Es Con Field Hokkaido, has focused on the concept of “enhancing fans’ experience of a live performance.”

The 15-meter distance is part of that concept. Fans in the first row behind the backstop would be closer to the catcher than the pitcher.

“You can watch baseball on television, but the ‘you-are-there’ feeling is something that cannot be shown on TV, and it is an important factor,” Ogawa said during a press tour of the stadium on Nov. 3. “We want to place value on that type of live experience to urge people to come to the ballpark.”

Closing the gap between the stands and the playing field has been a recent trend at major league stadiums. In fact, the distance from the backstop to home plate is less than 60 feet at many MLB venues.

“It is OK for ballparks to have many different characteristics,” said Aki Inose, a baseball analyst. “I don’t see the point of spending hundreds of millions of yen to renovate the (Fighters’ new) stadium.”

Team officials said other planned characteristics of the new stadium are rarely seen in typical ballparks, including artwork by young creators displayed here and there.

Tower Eleven is also the name of a five-floor building in the stadium. Its top floor will be a hotel, and guests can watch ballgames from their rooms and the rooftop.

Other features of the stadium include an “onsen” hot spring facility, a sauna and a food court. A brewery-restaurant with a view of the field will open, too.

These facilities will be open year-round.

(This article was compiled from reports by Kenichiro Hatanaka and Eiji Noda.)

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