March 29, 2000: Major League Baseball In Japan

March 29, 2000, 25 years ago: For the 1st time, a Major League Baseball regular-season game is played outside of North America. The New York Mets and the Chicago Cubs play the 1st of 2 season-opening games at the Tokyo Dome in Japan.

From 1938 to 1987, the Tokyo-based Yomiuri Giants played at the 42,337-seat Korakuen Stadium. In 1988, they moved next-door to the 55,000-seat Tokyo Dome, known as "The Big Egg" because of its shape, which included a white fabric roof, similar to the Metrodome in Minneapolis, the Silverdome outside Detroit, the Hoosier Dome in Indianapolis, and (formerly) BC Place in Vancouver.

As is the case with most domed stadiums, and most stadiums in Japan regardless of whether there's any kind of roof, the Dome has artificial turf. The field is symmetrical: 329 feet to the poles, 375 to the power alleys, and 400 to center. Like most domes that host baseball, it favors hitters over pitchers.

The Mets and the Cubs were chosen because of the size of their markets and their international appeal -- and also because the most obvious matchup, the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox, weren't willing to each give up a home game's revenue against their arch-rivals to play on the other side of the world.

Game time, local, was 7:05 PM, making it 6:05 AM in New York, and 5:05 AM in Chicago. Cliché Alert: Walks can kill you, especially the leadoff variety. Eric Young Sr. led off the game by drawing a walk on Mike Hampton, who was making his Mets debut. He stole 2nd, and was singled home by Damon Buford.

In hindsight, that was a sign that the Mets were going to have a great season anyway: Buford was the son of Don Buford, the Baltimore Orioles left fielder who hit Tom Seaver's 2nd pitch of Game 1 of the 1969 World Series for a home run, and while the Orioles won that game, the Mets took the next 4 for their "Miracle."

The score remained 1-0 until the bottom of the 3rd, when a sacrifice fly by Darryl Hamilton tied it. Did I mention that walks could be deadly? In the top of the 5th, Buford led off with a single, and after a lineout by Mark Grace, Hampton walked Sammy Sosa, walked Henry Rodriguez to load the bases, and walked Shane Andrews to force home a run.

Andrews hit a home run off Dennis Cook in the 7th, making him the 1st major leaguer to homer outside North America. Grace became the 2nd, taking Rich Rodriguez deep in the 8th. The Mets tried their own spin on the walks cliché: Edgardo Alfonzo led off the bottom of the 8th with one, and Mike Piazza hit a home run.

But they could get no closer, and the Cubs won, 5-3. Jon Lieber went 7 innings to become the winning pitcher. With some irony, Rick Aguilera, a member of the last Met title team in 1986, closed it out for the Cubs.

The Mets were designated the "home team" for this game. The next day, it was the Cubs' turn to be the "home team," but it was, again, the "away team" that emerged victorious. The game was tied 1-1 in the top of the 11th inning, when the Mets loaded the bases, and got a grand slam home run. With some appropriateness, given that it was in Japan, it was hit by Benny Agbayani, their Hawaiian native who, like Hawaiian pitcher Sid Fernandez, wore Number 50 in honor of his home, the 50th State, the site of Japan's 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor.

The games were roaring successes, in every sense of the word: Competitiveness, box office, and public relations. Knowing that any future attempts would have to be done by teams willing to stop Spring Training early, and then take a few days' break to reacclimate themselves to U.S. time, they now had the template for how to run a Japan series.

In 2004, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays beat the Yankees 8-3 on March 30, but the Yankees, with Japan's biggest baseball star, Hideki Matsui, homering at his former home dome, came back on March 31 to win, 12-1.

The Tokyo Dome hosted another series in 2012: The Seattle Mariners beat the Oakland Athletics, 3-1 on March 28; and the A's returned the favor on March 29, 4-1. In 2019, it was again the A's and the M's, with the M's sweeping, winning 9-7 on March 20, and 5-4 on March 21. The 2025 season opened on March 18 and 19, with the Los Angeles Dodgers sweeping the Chicago Cubs, 4-1 and 6-3.

The Tokyo Dome has also hosted 12 NFL games, all of them preseason exhibitions. And the Japan games also inspired MLB to schedule regular-season games in Australia and Britain.