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The Kuraimakkusu Shirīzu is the current annual playoff system implemented by Japan's Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). It determines which team from the Central League (CL) and from the Pacific League (PL) will advance to compete for the championship in the Japan Series. After the creation of the NPB's two-league system in 1950, the PL experimented with three different playoff systems. In 2004, it implemented the postseason structure from which the Climax Series is based. After three seasons, the CL adopted the same system in 2007, creating the current, unified playoff format.
Both leagues play a regular season, after which the top three teams in each league compete against one another in a two-stage playoff. In the first stage, the teams that finish the regular season with the second- and third-best records play one another in a best-of-three series. The winners of these three-game series advance to the final stage to face each league's regular-season champion in a six-game series, which the regular-season champion starts with a one-game advantage. The winners of each league's final stage series compete against one another in that year's Japan Series.
Originally, the top finisher in the league at the end of the season was only supposed to receive home advantage throughout the second stage, but in August 2003, PL officials announced that if the first-place team led the second-place team by more than five games at the end of the regular season, that team would also receive a one-game winning advantage in the second stage's best-of-five series. For the 2006 Pacific League Playoffs, PL officials removed the five-game lead requirement in favor of automatically awarding the first-place team the one-win advantage. In conjunction with this change, the first-place team no longer had home-field advantage for the entirety of the second stage; instead, the remaining four games were to be split evenly between both teams' stadiums. This rule change became a non-factor after the eventual first-place Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters clinched a Japan Series berth in two straight games.
During the three years of the PL's playoff system, the winner of the PL's postseason tournament competed against the CL team who finished the regular season with the best record. The disparity between the two leagues' postseasons provoked some criticism from baseball analysts and insiders. During the 2005 Japan Series, The Japan Times Stephen Ellsesser called NPB's unbalanced postseason a "bad system" and believed that the CL's decision to not implement a playoff system of their own was "foolish". Citing the Hanshin Tigers' poor Japan Series performance, he speculated that the CL's lack of postseason play was a disadvantage. Ellsesser believed that the 17 days between their last regular-season game and the first Japan Series game did nothing to prepare the Tigers for the eventual championship series against the Chiba Lotte Marines, who had played continuously. Like Ellsesser, after seeing the "excitement" that the 2004 PL Playoffs caused, then-Marines manager Bobby Valentine was "incredulous that the Central League didn't follow suit" and create a playoff series of their own.
In September 2006, both leagues agreed on a unified postseason system. The CL implemented a playoff system identical to the PL's, and the entire playoff series was dubbed the "Climax Series". The PL agreed to name the regular season first-place finishers league champions rather than the team that won the leagues' respective playoffs—a reversal from the previous three seasons. It was decided that both leagues would play 144 regular-season games, the first time both leagues would play the same number of games since the PL introduced its playoff system in 2004. The two leagues also agreed that neither regular-season champion should receive a one-game advantage in the final stage of the Climax Series, claiming that it was unnecessary from a business point of view. It had been suggested that the Yomiuri Giants voted to approve the playoff idea in 2006 because they had not finished atop the standings in the regular season since 2002 and the playoff concept would increase the Giants' chances of winning the Japan Series. However, the plan backfired on them. In the Climax Series' inaugural season, the Giants finally won the CL pennant but were still denied a Japan Series berth when they were defeated by the second-place Chunichi Dragons in a three-game sweep during the final stage of the 2007 Central League Climax Series. The next season, the leagues overturned their decision on the final stage advantage and agreed to award their champions an automatic one-win advantage in the final stage starting with the 2008 Climax Series. At the same time, the final stage changed from a best-of-five series and became a best-of-seven series, where the first team to accumulate four wins advances to the Japan Series.
The 2020 season, shortened to 120 games because of the COVID-19 pandemic, featured a modified Climax Series. The PL Climax Series had the season's top-two seeded teams play a best-of-five series, with the league's champion still being awarded the automatic one-win advantage. The CL forwent a playoff series completely, instead advancing their league champion directly to the Japan Series. The CL's decision to eliminate their Climax Series was due in part to just two of the league's six teams regularly playing in domed stadiums, making it unclear how many games would need to be made-up at the end of the season due to potential rainouts.
Central League
Pacific League
The first stage is a best-of-three series involving the regular season's second- and third-place finishers, with all games played at the second-place team's home field. The winner of this series goes on to face the league's pennant-winner in the final stage. This series is best-of-six. The league champion is awarded a one-win advantage as well as home field advantage for the entire series, unlike most professional leagues where a 5-game playoff series runs 2-2-1 or 2-3 or a 7-game playoff series that runs 2-3-2 with the higher seed receiving the extra game. The winning teams advance to the Japan Series, where they compete against one another. Unlike Major League Baseball (MLB), NPB games may end in a tie if there is no winner after 12 innings of play. If a Climax Series game results in a tie, the win is credited to neither team. If this causes the series to end in a tie, the higher-seeded team advances.
| + Central League Climax Series results !scope="col" | Year !scope="col" | Stage !scope="col" | Home team !scope="col" class="unsortable" | Games !scope="col" | Road team !scope="col" | Stadium !scope="col" | Most Valuable Player !scope="col" class="unsortable" | Notes |
| Yomiuri Giants | 0–3 | Chunichi Dragons* | Tokyo Dome | |||||
| Yomiuri Giants* | 3–1–1 | Chunichi Dragons | Tokyo Dome | |||||
| Yomiuri Giants* | 4–1 | Chunichi Dragons | Tokyo Dome | |||||
| Chunichi Dragons* | 4–1 | Yomiuri Giants | Nagoya Dome | |||||
| Chunichi Dragons* | 4–2 | Tokyo Yakult Swallows | Nagoya Dome | |||||
| Yomiuri Giants* | 4–3 | Chunichi Dragons | Tokyo Dome | |||||
| Yomiuri Giants* | 4–0 | Hiroshima Toyo Carp | Tokyo Dome | |||||
| Yomiuri Giants | 1–4 | Hanshin Tigers* | Tokyo Dome | |||||
| Tokyo Yakult Swallows* | 4–1 | Yomiuri Giants | Meiji Jingu Stadium | |||||
| Hiroshima Toyo Carp* | 4–1 | Yokohama DeNA BayStars | Mazda Stadium | |||||
| Hiroshima Toyo Carp | 2–4 | Yokohama DeNA BayStars* | Mazda Stadium | |||||
| Hiroshima Toyo Carp* | 4–0 | Yomiuri Giants | Mazda Stadium | |||||
| Yomiuri Giants* | 4–1 | Hanshin Tigers | Tokyo Dome | |||||
| Tokyo Yakult Swallows* | 3–1–0 | Yomiuri Giants | Meiji Jingu Stadium | |||||
| Tokyo Yakult Swallows* | 4–0 | Hanshin Tigers | Meiji Jingu Stadium | José Osuna | ||||
| Hanshin Tigers* | 4–0 | Hiroshima Toyo Carp | Koshien Stadium | Seiya Kinami | ||||
| Yomiuri Giants | 3–4 | Yokohama DeNA BayStars* | Tokyo Dome | Yasutaka Tobashira |
| + Pacific League Climax Series results !scope="col" | Year !scope="col" | Stage !scope="col" | Home team !scope="col" class="unsortable" | Games !scope="col" | Road team !scope="col" | Stadium !scope="col" | Most Valuable Player !scope="col" class="unsortable" | Notes |
| Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters* | 3–2 | Chiba Lotte Marines | Sapporo Dome | |||||
| Saitama Seibu Lions* | 4–2 | Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters | Seibu Dome | |||||
| Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters* | 4–1 | Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles | Sapporo Dome | |||||
| Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks | 3–4 | Chiba Lotte Marines* | Yahoo Dome | |||||
| Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks* | 4–0 | Saitama Seibu Lions | Yahoo Dome | |||||
| Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters* | 4–0 | Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks | Sapporo Dome | |||||
| Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles* | 4–1 | Chiba Lotte Marines | Kleenex Stadium | |||||
| Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks* | 4–3 | Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters | Yafuoku Dome | |||||
| Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks* | 4–0 | Chiba Lotte Marines | Yafuoku Dome | |||||
| Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters* | 4–2 | Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks | Sapporo Dome | |||||
| Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks* | 4–2 | Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles | Yafuoku Dome | |||||
| Saitama Seibu Lions | 2–4 | Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks* | MetLife Dome | |||||
| Saitama Seibu Lions | 1–4 | Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks* | MetLife Dome | |||||
| Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks* | 3–0 | Chiba Lotte Marines | PayPay Dome | |||||
| Orix Buffaloes | 3–1–0 | Chiba Lotte Marines | Kyocera Dome Osaka | |||||
| Orix Buffaloes* | 4–1 | Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks | Kyocera Dome Osaka | |||||
| Orix Buffaloes* | 4–1 | Chiba Lotte Marines | Kyocera Dome Osaka | |||||
| Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks* | 4–0 | Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters | Mizuho PayPay Dome | Hotaka Yamakawa |
Through the years, various modifications the Climax Series' rules or format have been suggested. To address the matter of lower or losing teams possibly advancing, some have proposed giving the league champion an extra game advantage in the final stage if they won the league by ten or more games or, even stricter, a team would simply be excluded from the postseason if they finished the regular season with a record below .500. Others, however, suggest that NPB could instead fundamentally change their league structure and postseason format. Sportswriter Ko Hiroo takes inspiration from MLB's Wild Card Series and proposes that NPB's twelve teams should be restructured from two leagues to three divisions. A new restructured postseason would then have the league winners automatically advancing to the second round along with the winner of a series between two wild card teams that finished the season with the highest winning percentage but did not win a league. Taro Bando, a lecturer at Jumonji University, also suggests restructuring the NPB, however he goes farther by proposing that four new teams should be added to create four divisions allowing for two series between division winners.
When looking at two postseasons, one before and one after the implementation of the Climax Series, Hiroo concludes that the addition of a playoff has had a positive effect on NPB from an entertainment and business perspective. In 2003, with the Japan Series as the only postseason series, only two teams were involved in seven games over ten days that had a total attendance of 286,197 people. In contrast, when both leagues first implemented a playoff system in 2007, six teams were involved in 18 games that spanned 24 days and drew 708,220 people, demonstrating that more fans were engaged with the league for a longer period of time.
Baseball analyst Yusuke Okada believes that Japanese and American baseball fans' perceptions of the postseason differ. He asserts that in the US, the regular season is viewed as a kind of "qualifying round" for the postseason, which is considered the season's "main event". Japanese fans, in contrast, tend to place a higher importance on the results of a long, hard-fought regular season and see it as unfair if the regular season winner is eliminated in a single series prior to the Japan Series. Okada believes the Climax Series strikes a balance between these two completing perspectives while also providing fans with more dramatic baseball.
The most scrutinized aspect of the Climax Series is the one-game advantage that is awarded to the regular-season champions for the final stage. When the rule was implemented the for the 2008 Climax Series, many players reacted negatively with some describing the rule as "unfair", "bad", "bull" and "messed up". Former player and current manager Alex Ramírez, however, believed that the league champion deserves the advantage. The Japan Times columnist Jason Coskrey believes that the "phantom win" gives the pennant winner too much of an advantage. According to him, the first stage bye plus all home games during the final stage should be advantage enough for the top-seeded team. He describes the situation as NPB "trying to have its cake and eat it too" by trying to reap the benefits of a playoff system while also trying to maintain the traditional showdown of pennant winners in the Japan Series. Looking back over the first ten years of the Climax Series, Satoshi believed that it was an ideal form postseason entertainment. Through that time, the league champion won the Climax Series and advanced to the Japan Series almost 82% of the time. He believed this to be the right balance as it maintained the importance of the regular season while also allowing for an occasional surprise that excited fans.
In 2017, the system again drew criticism, this time for allowing games to be called early because of weather and treating them as (postseason games in North America's Major League Baseball since 2009 must be played to the full nine innings). After the Yokohama DeNA BayStars lost a 5-inning game in the 2017 Central League Climax Series, Coskrey wrote that playoff games should never end in that manner. He suggested that NPB could have easily suspended the game and resumed where it left off the next day or even postponed the game entirely until the next day. Similarly, in an article for Yahoo Sports, Craig Calcaterra called the Climax Series "super unfair" after the incident and imagined a similar hypothetical situation in the MLB playoffs and concluded that fans would "riot".
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