Land of the Setting Sun

For the past week or ten days, a team of Major League Baseball all-stars have been in Japan playing exhibition games against teams from the Japanese leagues. At first I was kind of excited about it. After all, it is baseball and it does feature Major League players. This enthusiasm waned when I found out that the games would not be televised. I can't for the life of me figure out why. I mean ESPN has been showing re-runs of their nine ball pool tournament for the past week. I would much rather see baseball than listen to an announcer attempt to get me excited about two fat guys with sticks smacking a ball around a table with holes at the corners. There is just so much you can get out of watching balls spin around a table as the result of a break. Instead, I found myself surfing the satellite dish looking for Japanese television and the game. There is something to be said about watching baseball being announced in Japanese. Other than the player names, I had no idea what they were saying. It didn't matter though because at least I was watching baseball. Of course I had to change channels as soon as the game was over. Right after baseball was Sumo wrestling. There is just something unnatural about watching two fat guys in thongs trying to give each other wedgies while hundreds of people watch and cheer.