I’m not a baseball fan. Only occassion I got excited before was when Hideo Nomo made sensation in the major league baseball in the USA.

But today I again was glad to know Darvish made a good result in the game with Yankees.  Although Yankees pitcher was also a Japanese player, Kuroda, I’m not interested in Kuroda at all.  Darvish has something special enough to excite me from the first time I saw his play in Japan.

It’s a little sad to see him in the USA because he is not in Japan any more, but his great play encourages me all the time.

I feel fine today because Darvish did it well.

Today a Sumo wrestler, Baruto ( Balt) got the victory in the 1st season of Sumo series in Japan. It’s the first championship for Baruto, also for Sumo wrestler from Estonia.

It’s still in the middle of the champion battle race, as today is the 13th day of 15 day competition,   he won championship with no loss without waiting for the final day match.

Congratulations !

It’s easy to suppose how his life was hard in this far east land without knowing language or custom of Japan.  Now he speaks fluent Japanese and behaves like a champion in a gentle and traditional way that Sumo champions should be.

I hope fans in his country, Estonia, also is glad to hear this news.

News says that a Japanese baseball pitcher, Yu Darvish, finally had an agreement on the contract with Texas Rangers with 60 million dollars for 6 years.

Japanese fans seem very glad to know this news,  although some of his fans would miss him as they can’t see his pitching live in Japanese stadiums.

Many Japanese players went across the Pacific Ocean to Major League Baseball of the USA.  Among them, I personally think Darvish is the most expected player with such ability on both sense in physically and mentally.

He controls himself to construct ideal body structure for best pitching form, and it’s carried out under perfect planning targeting on the playing term in a year.  He is a given talent player indeed, but we know he is at the same time smart in achieving his ideal results.

It’s fact that we are deeply impressed to see his play.  He has various types of pitching.  Fast ball is amazing, also carve, slider, sinker, and more wondrous breaking balls leave us stunned.

HIdeo Nomo was also a fabulous pitcher,  however,  Darvish could top the record of Hideo Nomo in the Major League baseball.  Daisuke Matsuzaka went to Boston Redsox with high expectation some years ago but no good result since then.  I didn’t expect him at all, at the time, I wondered why many said Daisuke Matsuzaka would be great in the USA.  Apparently Darvish is far greater than Daisuke Matsuzaka.

We all expect Darvish with much loving support.

Yu Darvish is really an expected pitcher in Japan.  He debuted in the national  high school  games in Japan, and after joining the pro-league he never failed to show his guts in pitching and the results were always amazing each year.

Personally, among the Japanese players in American major league teams,  I think Hideo Nomo and Darvish are the real heroes  for me.

Hideo Nomo is still in my memory as the van of the Japanese baseball players who went across the Pacific Ocean to the USA.  He already was million dollar income player in Japan, but he decided to go to the USA as a test player with only 100,000 dollar contract a year.   The result of his brave action was now known to all of us in Japan.

And Darvish is truly exciting pitcher now in Japan.  He is the god-sent talent in baseball but he never stop his efforts for enhancement of his pitching.  He is a little like Ichiro Suzuki in the sense that both players are, in a way, stoic and never compromise whatever the results are.

I thought Darvish would soon get contracted with Texas Rangers after the first negotiation right on Darvish was transferred to Rangers.

Some say the reason for delay in making contract is the gap of money between Darvish and Rangers.   As Boston Red Sox Apparently failed in getting a famous pitcher, Daisuke Matsuzaka,  it might be natural that American teams don’t want to bet such a big money to Japanese players.   Matsuzaka was really expected to win constantly every year, but he was not as good as the Japanese career.

I suppose that Darvish is a far greater pitcher than Daisuke Matsuzaka.   So I hope he would join in Rangers after all.

One different thing between my heroes, Darvish and Nomo, might be a hungry heart.  Nomo was really such a guy with hungry spirit to search for his dream and success in the USA with much less money, but as we know, Darvish is regarded a great player already before the contract, so he requests much much instead of being a dream weaver.

Homare Sawa got MVP prize by FIFA for 2011. It’s a nice news for her and football fans in Japan, too.

It’s a little strange that she is now a very famous football player in spite that there hardly were Japanese people who knew her before the world cup of 2011.

But it’s a beautiful story to know how she got today’s fame.

In Japan, women football were always under fiscally hard status.  Even the national team players work for temporary jobs or part time workers.

A player in the team needed to work as a bath washer every day to keep her football life.  Her income was under 20,000 USD then but she wanted to play football even if she was so poor.  I read something like that in a magazine in Japan.

Homare Sawa was a top player of Japan but with no exception, she was also living hard with small income before the world cup of  2011.  They say their life was not miserable because they were happy as along as they could play football.

In that sense, Japanese national women football team were like part time workers’ team.

Now I think the financial condition of women players  got a little better, but still it’s bad compared to male teams, or compared to just a normal women workers of Japan.

Because we knew this fact through media information when we watched the games of world cup 2011, all the Japanese were really teary about their honor.  They, players, wanted mental satisfaction of achievement, not the money, status, or fame.

Now Homare Sawa deserves receiving MVP prize.

As she worked hard and she gave us joy through the games,  she also should earn more.  It’s truly natural for the result of pursuit.

Today’s news is really shocking especially for baseball fans.  The super pitcher of Japan, Hideki Irabu was found dead in Los Angeles.  News added it might be suiside.

Hideki Irabu played in New York Yankees as we all remember.  Before his time in America, Hideo Nomo was featured as the first Japanese big player.  Hideo Nomo made remarkable records in major league baseball of the USA and his brave play style encouraged Japanese people then as we all thought Japanese small size players could not be successful in major league.

After Hideo Nomo’s noble success, such wonderful players as Ichiro, HIdeki Matsui, and more went across the Pacific ocean to the USA and Hideki Irabu was one of the big names who followed Hideo Nomo then.

Hideki Irabu was thought to be more talented in baseball than Hideo Nomo because Irabu had very fast ball and various types of pitching.  Against our expectation, he didn’t make such big success compared to Hideo Nomo although he became one of the famous players in the USA then.

Fans like us thought Hideki Irabu had problems in his character. He sometimes went outside of the team play harmony and often talked against team, supervisors, media and sometimes to fans.

After he retired baseball,  it seems that he tried to run restaurants in L.A.  News says it was not really successful.  He seems to have struggled much in both baseball life and in the rest of his life.

It’s really sad to see such era symbol player’s decadence and the death.  Irabu always carried a burden in his mind.  I often thought like that when I saw his play or his life although I didn’t know what it was.  Probably he needed to obey to its fatal burden after all.

Rest in Peace, Great Pitcher.

I think many of the Japanese are now sleepy because we all kept watching the final match of women’s world cup football games being held in Germany.  But it’s nearly forgetting to take a rest all through the last night as the team of Japan called Nadeshiko Japan won the 1st prize, gold medals, for the first time in the  Japanese foolball history.

The game was supposed to be a complete victory of the USA by many of football fans in the world. I also thought it would be like that even though I expected a good match.

I’m very very glad now just like all of them in Japan.  However, the game was apparently handled mainly by American team from the beginning to the ending.  Certainly there should have been a luck on Japanese team.  I think the only way to win the USA team for Japanese team was like the game pattern we saw this time because the physical potential of American players is far greater than Japanese team.  So, we were lucky in some ways.

But I respect the Japanese players very much. They didn’t give up until the sound of ending whistle, they kept running until the last minute.  I think they found a luck by restless running in the game.

Japan had a very hard time, yes, still in the hard time as we are still in the way to recovery from the damage of serious earthquake and tsunami.  More or less bad mood affected on them, I think.  What they did encouraged many numbers of Japanese people of lost heart by the disaster.

I don’t hesitate to thank the players.  They also are in the hard time just like all of us. We know many of them are working as part time workers to keep playing football.  They got the most precious experience in their life, and we saw the most beautiful life through them.  I thought we Japanese might be able to overcome the hardship again.

Thank you, beautiful people.

I don’t want to forget the friendship of the USA team.  The game was a very clean match with lots of fair sports spirit.  Thanks to American players,  we can accept the victory of Japanese team with good memory forever.  Also, the German supporters were really gentle in the games.  I understand this time how they German people  know the right attitude to enjoy sport games.

Anyway, I need to go to bed now.

An interesting news arrived today. I don’t know well about football, but being such a poor fan, even I know Zico as one of the top football players in the history.

Zico said he would have a Japanese grandson soon.

This is a little exaggerated expression though, what he meant is not far from the truth.
His son got married a girl of Japanese ancestry, and they will soon have a baby.

Zico used to be a very popular football player also in Japan because he once was a member of a team in Japan, calle Kashima Antlers. After he retired as a player, he returned to Japan as the director of all Japan team. His history in Japan nearly equals to the Japanese football milestone.

Probably Zico is the most beloved foreign player in Japanese football history.

We are very glad if he said it with a kind of family mind to us Japanese.

A Japanese football player, Yuto Nagatomo is a highly admired person in Japan as a representing football player of Japan and he is now playing for Internazionale Milano in Italy.

He often got good results in the past games and he is thought to be a player with god sent talent and a luck to be someone.

Yuto Nagatomo today is blessed an Italian championship victory as a member of Internazionale Milano.  Before him, some nice players like Nakata, or Nakamura also enjoyed their peak time in European teams but in a sense, Yuto Nagatomo might be the most successful Japanese player among some who belonged to overseas teams.

I’m not a soccer fan, so my idea about it is not correct, maybe.   But looking at Yuto Nagatomo’s smile when he’s with team mates, it makes me think he is the most natural in the non-Japanese team.

Nakata and Nakamura surely made a big impact on football fans in Japan and in some European countries.  But I thought they were still Japanese players in the teams.  Yuto Nagatomo looks just an international football player.  I don’t think he needs an title ” Japanese Player”.

Miki Ando is again back as world champion of figure skating competition at ISU World Figure Skating Championships 2011.  Miki Ando used to be a little nervous and naive type sport woman, but as far as recent her attitude is concerned, she probably has overcome her weakness inside herself.

Her words at interviews are filled with something positive, and it proves her life is in some ways content. Congratulations !

On the other hand, Miki Ando’s colleague, Mao Asada is somewhat lost.  Her face we saw through the tube of TV seemed being a little shadowed by spiritual darkness.  Apparently her performance was not brilliant as she used to, and it was certain that she was not satisfied with the result of her performance when she was finished it.

Mao Asada is a very tough girl although she is still 20 years old.  Actually she got silver medal at Vancouver Olympic in spite that at that time she had not made successful result before the Olympic games.  She has ability to overcome it just like Miki Ando does.

Miki Ando’s win was a pleasure for sports fans of Japan today.  We will expect her to continue her skating in this way, and also expect Mao Asada would come back to the top stage that she should stay on.