Aisin Sea Horses guard Shinsuke Kashiwagi is the Japan Basketball League’s 2007-08 MVP, the league announced on Thursday. Kashiwagi, who was third in steals (2.21 per game) and free-throw shooting percentage (82.72) and eighth in both assists (3.33) and 3-point percentage (37.16), was also selected the MVP for the All-Japan Championship in January. Kashiwagi plays for the national team. The JBL also announced its Best Five team: Kei Igarashi (Hitachi Sunrockers guard), Takehiko Orimo (Rera Kamuy Hokkaido guard/forward), Joji Takeuchi (Sunrockers forward), Kosuke Takeuchi(Sea Horses forward/center) and Marquis Estill (OSG Phoenix center).
Business
DoCoMo counting on R&D to stay ahead
by Kazuaki Nagata
NTT DoCoMo Inc., despite being Japan’s biggest mobile phone carrier, has been struggling against tough smartphone competition from KDDI Corp. and Softbank Corp., which is leading in that area. But one edge that the cellphone behemoth — it has more than 60 million subscribers ...