I am watching on NHK a game in the 95th annual Koshien summer baseball tournament between Urawa and Sendai. The score is tied 10-10 after eight innings. The Urawa pitcher has pitched the entire game, and has thrown 173 pitches to this point.

What a thrilling combination of drama and child abuse!

Yes, 15 days long annual summer event has started. People in Japan go crazy going for their high school from their prefecture.

My gripe is my favorite Japanese baseball team Han-shin Tigers� home turf is Koshien. So every summer Han-shin Tigers is forced to be on the road for close to 20 consecutive days. Every year Han-Shin Tigers� standing go down during summer Koshien tournament. It is not fair! No other team is forced to do that.

Well, if you talk about child abuse, isn�t it pretty much any school sports is abuse? Over here at the U.S. NCAA is a big *$#@ hypocrite! NCAA itself makes so much money by franchising but athletes get zero money. I guess it is not child abuse because in the U.S. people become legally adult at age at 18. In Japan people become legal adult at the age of 20 so some college athletes are child abuse in Japan.

When I used to teach at an university, school do so much to help athlete is their top programs, just like what is going on with Texas A&M�s Johnny Football investigation. But when it comes to athletes in such sports like archery or rowing the school could care less about those students. NCAA is abusing college kids!

Off my soapbox�

The NCAA doesn't govern high school. This is a high school tournament. Furthermore, the kid in question that I mentioned is a high school junior, which would make him about 16 years old, not an adult anywhere.

To follow up, the Urawa pitcher ended up hurting his leg on his 176th pitch, but stayed in the game until he gave up a single with two outs in the ninth on his 182th pitch, when the Urawa manager finally took him out for a replacement. The replacement promptly gave up a double that drove in the winning run and ended the game 11-10.

No high school baseball manager...no college baseball manager...no baseball manager at any level in America would let a pitcher throw 182 pitches in this day and age no matter how well he was pitching...let alone if he had given up 11 runs in the game.

EDIT: And it's really hard for me to feel sorry for the Hanshin Tigers being "forced" to play their games mostly in climate controlled domes during the dog days of August.