As manager Minoru Murayama (村山 実, Murayama Minoru, October 12, 1936 – August 22, 1998, born in Kita-ku, Kobe, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan, raised in Amagasaki) was a professional baseball player for the Osaka Tigers (later Hanshin Tigers) in Nippon Professional Baseball.

He was 18–10 that season with a microscopic 1.19 ERA to lead the league and also win the first Eiji Sawamura Award of his career.

The Sawamura would not have co-winners again until 2003, when Hanshin's Kei Igawa and Kazumi Saitoh of Daiei shared the award.

During his career as a player, his team, the Osaka Hanshin Tigers won the Central League Championship two times, 1962 and 1964.

He was inducted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame in 1993, then just five years later, he died due to rectal cancer at the age of only 61.