More Baseball

Last weekend, I ventured up to Tokyo to visit my friend, Tomo and then go to see the Japanese Olympic team play the Central League All-Stars.
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First, I took 3 or 4 trains for an hour and a half up to Tomo's apartment at the campus of the university where he is a chemistry post-doc. We hung out with his 1-year old daughter, Nao for a while. Later, his wife, Kyo came home and made us an udon (noodle) lunch and then we were off to the Tokyo Dome (aka The Big Egg) for the game. After our 1-hour journey, we arrived.

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The game was ok - I'm not really into exhibition games but it was nice to see the best of the Nippon League. The game was a rout, with the Olympic team (the best players) losing 11-2. I don't like these games because a) I don't know who to root for and b) it doesn't count for anything. I was surprised that Tomo was rooting for the All-Stars because they had 4 Hiroshima Carp players whereas the Olympic team had none (that tells you about the strength of the Carp).

I find it very interesting that Japanese baseball is continuing during the Olympics without the 24 best players (some teams losing 3 or 4 players and others losing none). It would seem to throw into question the results of the season.

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After the game we went to the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame which is housed in the Tokyo Dome. It's not very big but it's not inconsequential either. I most liked the displays on the World Baseball Classic victory and their record holders. The consecutive games played record holder and retired Hiroshima Carp player Sachio Kinugasa played 2215 games in a row! That's better than Lou Gehrig's number (2130) but was finally eclipsed by Cal Ripken (2632).

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The all-time home run champion is Sadahara Oh who played for the Tokyo Giants. His record of 868 home runs is pretty mind-boggling. 40 home runs a year is very good. 20 seasons is a long career. Yet 40 home runs for 20 consecutive seasons would still put someone 68 home runs short! Barry Bonds' (drug-enhanced) U.S. record is 762.

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Another 1 1/2 hours on trains brought me back home. For those keeping score at home: 4 hours of travel for about 4 hours of baseball and an hour and a half with Nao.