The variety show "Kaiun! Nandemo Kanteidan" (TV Tokyo, Tuesdays at 8:54 PM), hosted by talent Koji Imada, freelance announcer Akira Fukuzawa, and former Sakurazaka46 member Yuka Sugai, featured a baseball bat used by Shigeo Nagashima in practice about 70 years ago as a "treasure" in its June 23rd broadcast.
The client's father was a graduate of a prestigious baseball school and participated in the 1934 Summer National High School Baseball Championship. His senior at the time was Eiji Sawamura, and his junior was Hiroshi Nakao.
The prized baseball bat was a gift from Mr. Nakao to his father, and is usually propped up in a corner of the house. He valued it at 150,000 yen, but the appraisal result was a surprising 1,500,000 yen, which drew loud applause from the audience.
Appraiser Kiyoshi Yamamoto commented, "This is an extremely valuable bat that Nagashima actually used in his early professional career. At the time, it was difficult to have bats made specifically for players, so Nagashima apparently imported Major League bats from America at his own expense. This bat is a model bat of a player named George Kell, and judging from the shape of Nagashima's signature, it is believed to be a bat he used either in 1958, when he debuted with the Yomiuri Giants, or in 1959. I think it is a truly wonderful bat."
