Introduction: Myths of Japanese Baseball and the Game’s Cultural Representations

Abstract

In the summer of 2015, 41 years old and several years removed from a professional career as a baseball player in which he had achieved success on the most celebrated teams in both the United States and Japan, Matsui Hideki found himself again on the baseball diamond in a tightly contested championship game. Matsui was leading his own team in the Nippon Club’s fortieth annual President Cup Baseball Tournament, a tournament comprised of teams made up of bankers, engineers, and accountants of various ages and skill levels from Japanese businesses in the New York metropolitan area such as Kajima, Syscom, SMBC, and Mizuho. Matsui was feeling that same old itch to deliver in the clutch....