**UPDATE**

7/31/2012: Fukuoka, Japan – Admist growing rumours of strife within the clubhouse, the Fushigi Yugi Celestial Warriors held a press conference before this evening’s tilt with the Naha Shisa.  Appearing on stage to address the rumors of fighting with former coach Alberto Hidalgo were OF “Clam” Chouda and manager Toshiyuki Fujimoto.

“First let me thank everyone for coming and thank the team and fans for supporting me.  I feel awful about the rumors that me and coach Alberto Hidalgo got into a fight.  It has been eating me alive since it started, and I just wanted to say Alberto and I never got into any physical altercation,” said Chouda.

“Now it is true that he had a black eye and a broken nose, but I can tell you this: I had nothing to do with either.  Alberto and I did have different ideas on how hitting should be approached, but he was my coach and I listened.  Everyone who knows me knows that I am a peaceful person and avoid physical confrontation at all costs.   I hope now that the truth is out there, my head will be clear and I will perform better.“

“I am here to offer my full support of Clam and to back up his claim that he and Alberto never had an altercation,” said manager Fujimoto.  “I feel awful that this has been eating up Clam because he has to be one of the nicest kids I have ever coached.  He listens, puts in extra time before and after each game, does what is asked on and off the field, and does a bunch for the community.”

6/21/2012: Seoul, South Korea – Things aren’t going well for the Fushigi Yugi Celestial Warriors this season.  To start out spring training, they lost their #2 SP Masu Muto for the season.  Shortly after Muto’s injury, Mushanokoji Furkawa was injured for 4 weeks.  Then, after the first week of the season, starting RF Toyozo Okamoto was out 4 weeks, closer Takeji Nakayama was out 5 weeks, starting 3B Shigekazu Takashi out 6 weeks and, lastly, the #1 SP, Terry Fowler, out for 4 months.  What has this meant for the Warriors?  Not a good start, that is for sure; 15-23 and 10 GB from first place.  This is not what the team had hoped for in the beginning of the season.

So what did GM Gregory Abcarian do to help fix this mess?  Well, he traded away the #8 overall pick in the draft along with Juan Román to the Seoul Crushers for SP Chet Parker, SP Toshiki Nakagawa and OF Masaharu Sugimoto.  While some may say it is unwise to trade the #8 overall pick for band-aid solution, Abcarian remained very confident in the trade.

“Listen, no one could have predicted the injuries we were going to incur.  They just happened, and now we have to deal with it.  I made a mistake by giving Juan Román arbitration early this year, and his salary was weighing down the books for other moves I wanted to make.  Also, Parker and Nakagawa will help out our rotation for the next couple of years, but the piece I really like is Sugimoto.  He will make this trade well worth it in about two years, I predict.  Another reason we had to make this deal is that, while we aren’t winning at the current moment, our fans are supporting us, and for that we need to show them we are going to try,” said Abcarian.

In other C-Warriors news, there has been a major shakeup to the coaching staff all the way through the organization during the last week and a half.  We will start in Single-A with the Shojo Ninjas and the firing of first-year hitting coach Pedro Tavárez, whom the team decided wasn’t helping at all.  To take over his position, the team hired Carlos Martínez.  Martínez is expected to bring some more hitting discipline to the table and help players improve faster, something that the Ninjas have been failing to do.

At AAA, the Nichibitsu Crestas fired pitching coach George Mooney and hitting coach Kiyohisa Sanu.  Both of the coaches were hired this year, and while it didn’t look like Sanu was doing a bad job, the team thought it wise to get guys they thought would be better for long-term development.  The organization dished up some big bucks to bring in pitching coach Forest Sizemore.  Forest will be expected to get the current crop of young pitchers ready for the majors in next couple of years, as the team will be losing a couple guys via free agency soon.  The club then sent Shusui Takahashi from the majors to AAA to help develop some of the young hitters.  The team doesn’t see this as a demotion, but more of a credit to his ability to help hitters develop.

In the majors, the front office hasn’t been happy with its staff lately, so they fired bench coach Alberto Hidalgo, who was rumored not to have gotten along with most of the team.  It has been rumored that Hidalgo and well-known nice guy “Clam” Chouda got into a fistfight in the locker room, leaving Hidalgo with a black eye and broken nose.  The team went out and hired Matsusuke Tanaka, who is known as a player’s coach and will hopefully help the team get out of the funk they are in.  With Takahashi being sent to AAA, the club went out and signed Yoshio Sato to teach hitting in the majors.  He has years of expertise and is expected to help out the offense tremendously.  Sato also may switch at some time with Takahashi the team feels more help is needed in AAA.

So what does all this mean for the C-Warriors?  It means, while they are struggling, they are committed to putting a winning team on the field and the generals around them to lead them.  If the C-Warriors can get past these initial injuries, they may be a sleeper once again.