As of 18 October 2026. The 2026 Japan Series opens in Yokohama on Saturday, 24 October, and one of the two Cuban pitchers who spent the season in Nippon Professional Baseball will be in it. Liván Moinelo’s Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks swept the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters in the Pacific League Climax Series Final Stage and will meet the Yokohama DeNA BayStars. Raidel Martínez’s Yomiuri Giants are out: DeNA beat them 2–0 in the Central League First Stage, and Martínez gave up the deciding home run in the opener.
Both men are also listed on Pinar del Río’s roster for the 65th Serie Nacional, which is in its third week. Below are each pitcher’s postseason, his final 2026 regular-season line from NPB’s official register, and the Japan Series dates that decide when Moinelo’s year in Japan ends.
Moinelo: a short start, then a sweep
The Hawks won the Pacific League pennant, which gave them a one-win advantage in the Final Stage. They then won three straight at home against Nippon-Ham, who had finished third in the regular season: 6–4 on 14 October, 6–2 on 15 October and 6–2 on 16 October (NPB box scores; Daily Sports; Sports Hochi).
Moinelo started Game 1 and did not get through the third inning. NPB’s box score charges him with three earned runs in 2⅔ innings: six hits, three walks, one hit batter and three strikeouts. Nippon-Ham led 3–1 when he left. The Hawks then scored five runs in the fourth, helped by two Fighters fielding errors, and held on to win 6–4 (Daily Sports, 15 October). Moinelo did not pitch in Games 2 or 3.
Moinelo’s 2026 regular season
| Pitcher | Club, league, season | G | W–L | IP | SO | CG | ShO | ERA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liván Moinelo | Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks, Pacific League, 2026 | 7 | 6–1 | 47⅓ | 34 | 2 | 1 | 0.76 |
Seven games is not a sign of decline. Moinelo missed the first four months of the season and did not pitch a competitive game until 11 August; he won six of his seven outings after that (NPB register; our September report on his fifth win). One short start in October does not change that.
Raidel Martínez: a ninth-inning home run at Tokyo Dome
The Giants finished second in the Central League and hosted third-placed DeNA in a best-of-three First Stage. In Game 1 on 10 October, Martínez came on in the ninth with the score 1–1. With one out, DeNA’s Watarai hit a 3–1 fastball for a solo home run to right-centre, and DeNA won 2–1 (NPB box score; Daily Sports; Chunichi Sports). Martínez was charged with the loss: one inning, one hit, one run, one strikeout.
He did not hide from it afterwards. “失投だったと思います” — “I think it was a mistake pitch,” he told Daily Sports, adding that Watarai had hit it well. Martínez pitched a scoreless inning in Game 2 the next day, but DeNA won 4–1 and the Giants’ season was over (NPB box score).
Martínez’s 2026 regular season
| Pitcher | Club, league, season | G | W–L | SV | IP | SO | ERA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Raidel Martínez | Yomiuri Giants, Central League, 2026 | 57 | 5–4 | 42 | 52⅓ | 56 | 1.38 |
The 42 saves extend the run we covered in September, when he reached 40 for the third straight season. The home run in Game 1 was only the third he allowed all year, counting the two in the regular season.
Japan Series 2026: DeNA v SoftBank
DeNA reached the Japan Series by beating the pennant-winning Hanshin Tigers 4–1 in the Final Stage, the Tigers’ one-win advantage included (NPB box scores, 14–17 October). The Hawks are the defending Japan Series champions, and the series is a rematch of 2024, when DeNA beat them after losing the first two games (Sports Hochi). All times are Japan Standard Time.
| Game | Date | Home club | Start (JST) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Saturday 24 October | DeNA (Yokohama) | 18:30 |
| 2 | Sunday 25 October | DeNA (Yokohama) | 18:00 |
| 3 | Tuesday 27 October | SoftBank (Fukuoka) | 18:00 |
| 4 | Wednesday 28 October | SoftBank (Fukuoka) | 18:00 |
| 5* | Thursday 29 October | SoftBank (Fukuoka) | 18:00 |
| 6* | Saturday 31 October | DeNA (Yokohama) | 18:30 |
| 7* | Sunday 1 November | DeNA (Yokohama) | 18:00 |
* If necessary. Source: NPB official calendar, October and November 2026.
What it means for Pinar del Río
Pinar del Río named both pitchers on its 32-man list in September. The Serie Nacional regular season runs to 29 November. Martínez’s season in Japan ended on 11 October. Moinelo’s now runs to at least 28 October, and to 1 November if the series goes seven games.
No Cuban or Japanese source we have read says whether either pitcher will be released to pitch in Cuba this autumn, so we are not guessing. If either one appears in a Serie Nacional box score, we will report it with the date and the source.
Sources
NPB official site (October and November 2026 calendars; box scores for the Central League First Stage, 10–11 October, and both Final Stages, 14–17 October; Hawks and Giants 2026 pitching registers; all read 18 October 2026); Daily Sports, 10 October (Martínez’s home run and quotes) and 15 October (Final Stage Game 1); Chunichi Sports, 10 October (Martínez’s home run); Sports Hochi via pacificleague.com, 17–18 October (Hawks’ Japan Series preparation, the 2024 series). Quotation translated from Japanese by Cuba Dugout.
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