Liván Moinelo wins sixth Japan Series, most ever by a foreign player in NPB

Foto: Wikimedia Commons / Gaffky (CC BY-SA 4.0)

October 29, 2026

Cuban left-hander Liván Moinelo celebrated his sixth Japan Series title on Wednesday, October 28, 2026, after the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks beat the Yokohama DeNA BayStars 4-2 to complete a 4-0 sweep in the final of Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB).

The championship moved Moinelo past American Dennis Sarfate, with whom he had shared the mark of five titles, making him the foreign player with the most championships in Japanese baseball history, according to Swing Completo and 14ymedio. His six rings came in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2025 and 2026, the first four as a reliever and the last two as a member of Fukuoka's starting rotation.

Moinelo did not pitch in the clincher, in which SoftBank erased a two-run deficit on a Yudai Yamamoto triple and a Yuki Yanagita single, but he played a key role in the series: in Game 2 on October 25 he threw seven scoreless innings, allowing five hits and striking out eight.

A native of Pinar del Río, Moinelo arrived in Japan in 2017 and was named the Pacific League's Most Valuable Player in 2025. In the 2026 regular season, which he started late because of physical problems, he went 6-1 with a 0.76 ERA over 47.1 innings. The title is SoftBank's 13th Japan Series crown and its second in a row.

Fuente: Swing Completo; 14ymedio; Pacific League (pacificleague.com)

Liván Moinelo Pita

Sports, Baseball, Pitcher, Society, Professor

Liván is a baseball player for the Pinar del Río Baseball team, who made his debut in the LIIII National Baseball Series, 2013-2014 as a left-handed pitcher. He has had a good performance in his short career in this field. He participated in the 2015 Caribbean Series, with the Vegueros de Pinar del Río team, which was crowned champion of the same.