Nippon Pro Baseball handed out its monthly “MVP” awards Friday, which a colleague noted is odds since none of the awards is actually called Most Valuable Player, and there was one kind of surprise among the four winners.

This spring rainy season, we’re expecting rain for another four straight days in the Kanto region, wiped out the Tigers’ game in Yokohama and the Swallows’ game in Hiroshima, leaving four indoor games, including Sasaki’s third start this season against the Orix Buffaloes, and one where Sho Nakata, with 266 major league home runs under his belt, sacrificed for the first time in his 15-year career.

Shall we get going?

The most valuables

Instead of “Most Valuable Player” awards, each league hands out one Most Valuable Pitcher and one Most Valuable Hitter award. As we discussed on the last Japan Baseball Weekly Podcast, Roki Sasaki was an easy choice for the PL pitcher’s award. We talked about the decision for the PL’s top hitter between Nippon Ham Fighters’ Go Matsumoto and his empty .418 average through April 30 and Rakuten Eagles leadoff dynamo and Nippon Ham discard, Haruki Nishikawa.