About JapanBall

Hey there! I’m Shane Barclay, the owner and operator of JapanBall.

I don’t recall exactly when or how it happened, but the first thing that I remember feeling true love for as a child was baseball. That love has remained constant, and I’ve devoted myself to the game ever since, whether in social, athletic, academic, or professional settings.

I wrote my college application essay about Michael Lewis’s Moneyball and how I intended to use my education to get a job in baseball. For the first couple of years at  UC Berkeley (Go Bears!), my baseball-related studies were limited to co-ed rec softball and taking international students and friends to “Dollar Wednesdays” at Oakland Coliseum. Then, I chose to study abroad in the Dominican Republic to experience a baseball-crazed culture and learn Spanish.

After graduation, the Arizona Diamondbacks hired and assigned me to the Visalia Rawhide of the California League. I endured the infamous long bus rides and brash clubhouses of the minor leagues… and loved every minute of it. Then, it was back to the Dominican Republic to work for MLB’s Office of the Commissioner.

I worked for MLB for two years in the D.R. and seven in Manhattan. My duties included international player development, contract approvals, and working on MLB-operated events such as the World Baseball Classic, All-Star Futures Game, and Arizona Fall League.

While in New York, I married my life’s second true love (in sequence, not importance) – Jessie. Jessie and I grew up together in Cupertino, California and, although the bustle of New York City was tons of fun, the pull of home was too strong. In 2018, after a final MLB assignment working the Arizona Fall League, we moved to Santa Cruz, where the decision of “beach or mountains” replaced “subway or taxi,” and I could doggedly begin to fulfill my imagined destiny of being a surfer.

MLB continues to retain me as a consultant on the World Baseball Classic, and I am Vice-Chair of SABR’s Asian Baseball Committee, but I needed even more of a baseball fix after leaving MLB full-time. So, I parlayed the coolest parts of my former job (traveling and watching baseball) into working with Bob Bavasi of Bavasi Sports Partners on his long-running JapanBall tours. While doing so, I earned certification as a Japan Travel Specialist from the Japanese Government’s National Tourism Organization and was quickly convinced to make baseball travel my professional focus.

After leading a number of his tours, I  assumed the operation and ownership of JapanBall in 2020. It is my goal to strengthen our Japanese base while growing into a truly global source for baseball travel and information.

I am thrilled to continue exploring the world with fellow adventurous baseball lovers.

I’ll see you at the ballpark!

Trevor Raichura, originally from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, is our on-the-ground source for Japanese baseball news. He graduated from the University of Manitoba with a Bachelor of Education in 1998 and moved to Japan soon after. He spent the next twelve years living in Okinawa, home of NPB spring training! He learned the Japanese language on his own, studying wherever he could: at work, karaoke, while shopping, watching TV and movies, and more. The results spoke for themselves: Level 3 of the Kanji Proficiency Test (the equivalent of junior high graduates) in 2009 and Level N1 of the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT) in 2010.

He spent a year in Hokkaido before moving to the Kansai region in 2011. He got married the next year to Yumi, a Kobe native, and they have since settled in Nishinomiya, where they are raising their two sons. Living in this area means constant (wanted or unwanted) exposure to the Hanshin Tigers, and in 2014, Trevor took the plunge into their world. Since then, he has started and maintained an English-language website (thehanshintigers.com) with extensive team and player information, both past and present. His full-time job is teaching English at various universities in the region, but his passion for Japanese baseball is evident through his outside activities. Not only is he the primary JapanBall NPB News Correspondent, but he also assists with our tours, writes a Japanese column about baseball for Daily Sports Online, and conducts research related to international baseball culture.