Baseball J-drama you should watch

Japan's love for baseball goes way back to the late 1800's. The sport is the Land of the Rising Sun's undisputed favorite. It comes as no surprise that Japan also has the greatest baseball stories outside America. Here, we'll talk about two gems that showcase baseball and the lives of players surrounding it.

H2 is based on a manga with the same name created by Mitsuru Adachi, a well-known genius when it comes to tales woven around baseball. H2 follows the story of two middle school students who were nearing their dreams to reach Koshien, the most prestigious stage of Japanese high school baseball, until they suffer injuries that were said to be fatal to their baseball career. The two decide to leave their dreams behind and enroll in a school where there was no baseball team.

However, it turns out that the doctor they consulted was a quack. Stuck with no official baseball club, they had to form their own with the help of an enthusiastic female manager and a bunch of lazy baseball otaku.

Personally, I don't find the premise all that special. What H2 pulled off really well was the interactions between the main characters, particularly among protagonist Hiro Kunimi who helped his friend Hideo Tachibana to get together with his childhood friend and unproclaimed lover Hikari Amamiya. Meanwhile, team manager Haruka Koga falls in love with Hiro but Hiro still has feelings for his bestfriend's girlfriend.

Next is Rookies, a story of a violent karate expert who is somehow a teacher and a group of very violent delinquents in the baseball club. While it has roots similar to H2, the prominent themes are widely different. If H2 is a love story within baseball, Rookies is heart-warming tale of friendship and reaching for your dreams.

What's so good about Rookies is that it accurately portrays a group of teenage delinquents, complete with heavy doses of male pride, violence, and value for each other in the gang. I've never seen a TV drama series where the fist hits the face every five minutes, but it perfectly sets the atmosphere for a show about a bunch of delinquents who struggle to express their feelings and discover what they want to do later in life.

To sum it up, H2 is a very engaging and twisted love story where you never know who you want to root for. Rookies is an intimate look into delinquency perfect for the bros. Watch either of them and I'm sure you won't be disappointed.