Tokyo Junkie

Home of Robert Whiting, best-selling author and journalist

Category: Articles

  • 150th Anniversary of Baseball in Japan – Yukan Fuji

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    by Robert Whiting (2022) The coming year will mark the 150th Anniversary of Baseball in Japan. The game was introduced  to the Japanese in 1872 by an American professor named Horace Wilson, who had been invited to come to Tokyo and teach at Kaisei Gakko. He was one of many foreign teachers and technical advisors recruited by the…

  • Shohei, Boog and Big Mac

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    By Robert Whiting YUKAN FUJI (2018) ESPN analytics whiz Sam Miller did an extensive evaluation of Shohei Ohtani, 2018 Rookie of the Year, as a batter and came to the conclusion that the MLB player most like is former Baltimore Orioles slugger Boog  Powell, Powell, 6’3” 235 pounds in the prime of his playing days, was a line drive hitting first baseman who averaged 30…

  • Wall-to-wall coverage of Shohei Ohtani is more than justified

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    By Robert Whiting – October 28, 2024 It’s impossible to live in Japan and not know who Shohei Ohtani is. The baseball star of the Los Angeles Dodgers dominates the media. His in-game exploits usually occupy the front page of Japan’s ubiquitous sports dailies, whose combined circulation runs in the millions. Most of the time…

  • After quake and tsunami, public split on baseball’s return to Japan

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    by Robert Whiting (Apr 11, 2011) – Sports Illustrated Besuboru is finally back in Japan, after a delay caused by the worst earthquake in the nation’s history and an ensuing tsunami that ravaged Northeastern Honshu. The Nippon Professional Baseball League (NPB) launches its season on April 12, 15 days later than scheduled, and Nippon leaders…

  • The Fans in Japan: Why they’re happy when baseball players go on strike

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    by Robert Whiting (Sep 29, 2004) – Slate They said it would never happen: A baseball strike in harmony-conscious Japan? Yet two weeks ago, after lobbying unsuccessfully to block the proposed merger of two of the country’s 12 professional baseball teams, the Nippon Professional Baseball Players Association walked out for the first time in 70…

  • Pitching From Behind: The sad road of Japanese pitcher Hideki Irabu

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    by Robert Whiting (Aug 1, 2011) – Slate Last week, former New York Yankees pitcher Hideki Irabu was found dead in his Southern California home, having apparently hanged himself. The 42-year-old Irabu, a baseball sensation in his home country of Japan, had a short, tumultuous career in the United States. In his 2004 book The Meaning of…

  • Billion Dollar Blueprint

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    Robert Whiting (May 8, 2012) Money. Money. Money. MLB is rolling in it, as indicated by the recent sale of the Los Angeles Dodgers for an astonishing $2 billion, an all time record for a major league team. The $2 billion figure is more than double the previous record for an MLB franchise sale, which…

  • Tobaku

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    Robert Whiting (Oct 21, 2015) I have been reading with interest about the gambling scandal in professional baseball. Kyojinfarm team pitcher Fukuda has admitted he bet on baseball and has lost a considerable amount of money at it in the process. A couple of weeks later, two other players on the ni-gun(the farm team) followed suit. An…

  • Otani and Nippon Ham

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    Robert Whiting (Dec 9, 2012) Congratulations to Nippon Ham for making a successful attempt to convince Shohei Otani to stay in Japan instead of going to the MLB as he earlier vowed to do.  It had been widely believed that Otani was going to sign with the Los Angeles Dodgers, after he said he would…

  • ‘Besuboru’ Booming in Japan

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    Robert Whiting (March 1983) “This country has got its national flag all wrong,” remarked one bemused visitor from New York recently during his brief stay in Japan. “Instead of the Rising Sun in the center, there should be a baseball.” The multitude of American tourists who annually visit Japan find the same amazing phenomenon: a…