Hirokazu Ibata began his professional baseball career with the Chunichi Dragons in Nagoya in 1998. He played for 15 seasons with the club as an infielder, winning seven Golden Gloves and making five season-ending Best Nine teams. Ibata left the Dragons after the 2013 season, and when he retired two years later it was as a member of the Tokyo-based Yomiuri Giants.

As Ibata prepares to manage Samurai Japan at the Premier12 in November, the longtime NPB star might feel he was destined to lead his team along the same path in the fall. Japan will begin its Premier12 campaign in Nagoya and hopes to end it by winning the title in Tokyo.

“I feel like it's fate in a way,” Ibata said Friday. “But I just want our team to gain momentum in Nagoya and eventually win the whole thing in Tokyo.”

The third edition of the Premier12, which features the top 12 teams in the world rankings, will run from Nov. 9 to 24 and will be hosted in Japan, Mexico and Taiwan. The 12 nations will be split into two groups for the opening phase of the tournament. Group A (Mexico, the Netherlands, Panama, Puerto Rico, the United States and Venezuela) will begin play in Mexico, while Group B, which includes Australia, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, South Korea, Taiwan and defending champion Japan, will compete mostly in Taiwan. Japan and Australia, however, will play at Vantelin Dome Nagoya on Nov. 13.

The tournament will shift to Tokyo Dome for the Super Round and the final rounds. The final is scheduled for Nov. 24.

“The tournament is about two months away, but I’m already feeling the tension building,” Ibata said. “We will do our best to win back-to-back titles.”

The pressure on Ibata this fall will be twofold. His first job is to guide Japan to its second straight title, while his secondary objective is to put the top-ranked Japanese in position for sustained success on the international level.

"For Japan to remain No. 1 in the world, we need more young players to come up," Ibata said. "If they can gain experience and have good results, Japan will be strong for a long time."

The Premier12 is Ibata's first major test as a manager.

He was on Atsunori Inaba’s Samurai Japan coaching staff when Japan won the Premier12 in 2019, and again three years ago at the Tokyo Olympics, where Japan captured gold.

Ibata was named national team manager in October 2023, following Hideki Kuriyama, who stepped down in May after leading Japan to the World Baseball Classic title earlier that year. Ibata — who had been a coach with Yomiuri but had never managed when he was hired — guided Japan to victory in the Asia Professional Baseball Championship (APBC) last November and is now preparing for the tournament he was ostensibly hired to win.

“In November of last year, the team, led by our manager Ibata, won all the games in the Asia Professional Baseball Championship, which was a remarkable feat,” NPB Commissioner Sadayuki Sakakibara said. “Also recently, in Colombia, the WBSC Under-15 World Cup was held, and the team was also led by Ibata and won.

“I expect him to do well in this competition and win the title in the end.”

Ibata has been visiting teams and scouting players throughout the NPB season as he looks for the right mix of talent and experience to capture the title.

While he got a sense for some of the young talent in NPB at the APBC, an Under-24 tournament, he will be able to mix in players with more experience this fall.

“I want to pick players who have delivered results in the past,” Ibata said. “They do not necessarily need to have international experience as long as they can get results.”

The former infield maestro says it will be important for Japan to keep runs at a minimum.

“I think it all comes down to pitching and defense,” Ibata said. “The batters have to seize opportunities whenever they present themselves, but I think it all starts with pitching and defense.”

Japan will prepare for the Premier12 with a two-game series against the Czech Republic at Vantelin Dome on Nov. 9 and 10.

This year’s Premier12 comes on the heels of a wildly successful World Baseball Classic in 2023 and with baseball officials looking ahead to the sport’s return to the Olympic program at the 2028 Games in Los Angeles.

“The popularity of international baseball is now at an all-time high,” World Baseball Softball Confederation President Riccardo Fraccari said. “I'm expecting this edition of the WBSC Premier 12 to continue that momentum.”