TOKYO — The manager of the team that won the Japan Series baseball championship in 2005 wanted to take on the 2005 World Series champion Chicago White Sox in a seven-game series in Hawaii.

The idea didn't get very far, but Bobby Valentine still would like to see a showdown between Japanese and American baseball, and he says Hawaii would be the ideal setting.

He came up with the idea after his Chiba Lotte Marines won the Japan Championship and Major League Baseball was actually considering a 2006 World Baseball Classic.

The Boston Red Sox and Oakland Athletics are opening Major League Baseball's 2008 season in Japan next week, and Valentine is upset that his Japanese team is competing for fans by opening its season the same day.