The are a Japanese professional baseball team based in Fukuoka, Fukuoka Prefecture. They compete in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) as a member of the Pacific League. Founded on February 22, 1938 as the Nankai Club, being the first Kansai team to play in Osaka proper, the team went through a few name changes before settling on Nankai Hawks in 1947, eventually changing ownership in and moving to Fukuoka in . The team subsequently became known as the Fukuoka Daiei Hawks until 2005, when they were purchased by SoftBank Group, becoming the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks. Since 1993, the Hawks have played at the Fukuoka PayPay Dome, which has gone under several name changes and seats 40,000 people. The Hawks are often regarded as one of the most successful franchises in Pacific League and the richest in all of baseball under the ownership of SoftBank Group, with the second most wins in all of Japanese sports, only trailing the Yomiuri Giants. The Hawks have played in the Japan Series 20 different times. The club also won two Japanese Baseball League championships in 1946 and 1948 while the team was based in Osaka. The Hawks' 11 Japan Series championships, including seven championships between and , and 19 Pacific League pennants, with the most recent of both coming in 2020, are second-most in Pacific League and third-most in all of NPB. For various reasons, the Hawks experienced a 35 year title drought between and including a period of 26 years from to 1999 without a single Japan Series appearance, despite the relocation to Fukuoka. The drought finally ended in 1999, with gradual additions over the previous five years under new manager and home run king Sadaharu Oh. Under Oh (as manager and later executive), Daiei, and later SoftBank, the Hawks embraced internal development and sabremetrics as they eventually formed a baseball dynasty off of a core led by slugger Yuki Yanagita and aces Kodai Senga and Tsuyoshi Wada, capturing Japan Series titles in , , , , , , , and , making the Hawks first team since the -1973 Yomiuri Giants to win more than three consecutive championships. Through 2022, the franchise's all-time record is 5545-4931-399 (.529). The team's manager is Hiroshi Fujimoto and the organization's acting CEO is . History Nankai Electric Railway Company ownership (1938–1988) The franchise that eventually became the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks was founded on February 22, 1938 by