LIVESTREAM: Japan’s X League Game of the Week: Obic Seagulls v IBM Big Blue – Battle Of UCLA QBs

Two of Japan’s top teams over the past decade will face off this Sunday as multi year champions, the Obic Seagulls will face the 2016 Pearl Bowl winners IBM Big Blue.

The Seagulls have returned to dominance in the X League in 2016 and enter the game undefeated with a 4-0 record. Meanwhile IBM has lost two of their four games but by the narrowest of margins to the Fujitsu Frontiers, 2016 X Bowl finalists, and the Lixil Deers, 2016 semifinalists.

Battle of UCLA Quarterbacks

All eyes will be on the quarterbacking duel between IBM’s Kevin Craft (#3) and Jerry Neuheisel (#15) now playing for the Seagulls. Both Craft and Neuheisel are former UCLA quarterbacks. Craft is now a veteran of Japanese football having joined the Big Blue in 2012. Neuheisel arrived this year to play for Obic.

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Jerry Neuheisel

Neuheisel has started three of Obic’s four games this season and helped the Seagulls become one of the top offenses in the X League.

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Kevin Craft

Craft on the other hand, has suffered through an injury which sidelined him early in the season. He returned for the game against the Lixil Deers. Since joining the Big Blue in 2012 Craft has led or been close to the lead in passing every year since.

Kickoff: Sunday October 23, 2 PM (1 AM EDT, 7 AM CET)

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Roger Kelly is an editor and a writer for AFI. A former PR Director the B.C. Lions of the Canadian Football League for 7 years, he now lives in Sweden writing about and scouting American Football throughout the world.