I have been to see a couple of games of the Yakult Swallows: the healthiest team in all of baseball. However, being healthy in baseball doesn’t add up to much given the PED era and the sheer girth of Babe Ruth as they lost both of the games I saw. The former, their home opener, they were losing 6-1 going into the 9th inning but still managed to bring the tieing run to the plate. This was mainly due to the Hanshin Tigers (more of whom in a later post) running the pitch count on their starting pitcher to an eye watering 149. That said I think the Swallows have provided the best entertainment so far. First of all they play in a nice open-air stadium:

Secondly, at the stadium they serve Kirin Stout. Finally, they opened the first game with a small brass band:

Open air, stout, brass bands… it took me back to the Saddleworth Moor brass band competitions.

The fans were pretty interesting. Their singing was generally lead by the inferior brass band in the stands (read: a few trumpets). Most people seems to have these things:

They are banged together in the rhythm of the song being sung but actually make less sound than if you clapped. In fact, they sound like a pair of nun-chucks made by a child using a pair of toilet roll holders and some string. When the swallows scored this happened:

It’s probably not immediately evident but everybody is waving these umbrellas in time to the run scoring song. I think this could catch on on Manchester…