Minoru Ishiguro

Ishiguro receives little individual characterization outside his place on the varsity. The story focuses on the larger conflict between Daimon's recruited first-string program and Maeno's discarded players rather than developing Ishiguro's private motivations.

Ishiguro plays second base and bats seventh for Daimon's Seishuu varsity. During the first scrimmage against the prefab team, he demonstrates competent defense by handling balls put into play and contributing to recorded outs.

He also faces Kou as a batter once the latter enters the game. Kou's pitching immediately creates difficulties for players accustomed to facing the prefab team's ordinary pitchers.

Ishiguro is introduced as one of the players selected for Daimon's favored varsity squad. That placement puts him on the opposite side of the internal divide from Kou, Akaishi, Nakanishi and the other players training under Maeno.

During the first varsity-versus-prefab scrimmage, Ishiguro plays second base. He records defensive outs against the opposing lineup before later batting against Kou after the supposedly inexperienced pitcher enters the game.

When Daimon's program is eventually defeated and dismantled, Ishiguro leaves Seishuu's active roster along with most of the former first-string group.

Shuugo Daimon is Ishiguro's coach on Seishuu's original varsity squad and the person responsible for the first-string program in which he plays.

Yuuhei Azuma, Tatsumasa Miki, Noboru Kamikawa, Kinji Takizawa, Kazuo Ogura, Yuuji Kubo, Keisuke Kishibe and Tooru Onoda are among Ishiguro's teammates on Daimon's varsity.

Kou Kitamura faces Ishiguro during the varsity-versus-prefab scrimmage and retires him after entering as the prefab team's pitcher.