Baseball in Japan
Baseball in Japan is epic.
It’s so epic it’s not even called baseball. It’s called Yakyu.
It’s what it once was in America, but with a uniquely Japanese flavor. The game nestles right in to the culture and they’ve isolated the essence of baseball down to its core. In Japan it’s about the respect for tradition, respect for friends and foes, determination and a craftsman like attention to detail.
Their training regimen is the stuff of legend. Dozens of kids lined up, perfectly spaced, swinging in unison. Somehow making a very individual game, a collective pursuit.
There is black and white footage of Japanese greats honing their swing by chopping bamboo with a samurai sword.
High school baseball gets national TV exposure for an entire month every year. There is a massive single elimination tournament called Koshien that is the grand prize and dream of high school players. Teams from all over the land battle for the ultimate prize. Putting their 360 days of training to the final challenge. Taking perfect swings into the fires of media over exposure. The TV cameras capture it all. The glory of dominant pitching performances and the tearful group agony of defeat.
You can see the tightrope walk of hope and dreams played out before you in the comfort of your living room. It’s high drama, around a child’s game. There are no multi-million contracts out there. It’s guts versus guts. Preparation versus preparation. Willpower against hoping for the best.
The captains get interviewed, standing on stools, like elevated hovering deities above the voracious media. They speak of respect and gratitude. They are well spoken and mild mannered and afraid of being proud. They want to be a part of the game, not the very game itself. There are no prima donna A-Rods here. No LeBron James’ being groomed for something greater. For baseball in Japan, there is nothing higher than to achieve Koshien glory. You still hear Japanese major leaguers speak of their time in this tournament with legendary nostalgia.
It’s a game of traditions within traditions.
On the TV, at the end of every game, they show the players, down on hands and knees, scooping the black dirt of the infield into bags by the handful. Collecting a tangible memory of what just happened. A day of baseball they will never forget. A game that will live on in dusty remembrance in an office cubicle long after the glory of the moment has faded like a ball cap under the summer sun. Take this day with you young ball player.
They show players who didn’t even play, bursting with uncontrollable tears. So committed to the team that they sweat when their heroes sweat and bleed when they bleed. Young players with two years of playing ahead of them, destroyed by the gravity and importance of this one moment. What is a young mind to do with this kind of pressure? With the gaze of society and all those living rooms watching them. They know it and feel it and it is inescapable. All they can do is wash their still white uniform and hold onto their bag of dirtful memories and hope that next year or the year after, they will be the ones whose performance commands such smiles or tears.
This isn’t just baseball going on. There is something more real than sport. It’s a moment infused with the belief in a national pastime. Like when Babe Ruth roamed the Earth in America. And for a handful of years when Ken Griffey Jr. blew bubbles in the emerald expanses of Seattle.
Long live the national pastime of Japan.
Long live baseball.
Long live Yakyu.
