Unlike MLB, which manages its media relations in an orderly fashion, NPB has, for reasons I still cannot fathom, never stepped in to ensure that media covering the Japan Series have orderly and predictable access before and after the games.

Other than the required managers’ meeting on the Friday before Game 1, and the obligatory press conferences that day, the teams run everything.

Since NPB delegated media access to the teams in 2020 to develop individual COVID responses in regards to the media and fans, Japanese pro baseball has ended a 70-plus year tradition of allowing reporters in every park at every game on the field and in the dugouts before games while letting them follow players after the games.