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Lately, every year sees yet another star of Japanese baseball make his way to the US. Of course, there are still players competing in the Japanese leagues. But now there is emerging a sense that they are a slightly inferior breed. It seems these are the guys who never got the call from the big leagues in America.

A similar sort of phenomenon occurred still earlier in the world of soccer. Players with talent leave Japan to ply their trade in Europe. In this regard, baseball was behind the times. I feel sad to think of the Japanese leagues as no more than adjuncts to the “real” leagues in Europe and America.

However, my attitude is not to lament this phenomenon. I was born and grew up in the Kansai. The cultural landscape of Kansai nurtures comedians. Indeed, the region has produced a wealth of talent. But no sooner do they emerge into the limelight here than they head off to Tokyo; they abandon Kansai. And I have grown accustomed to this. I think of the hemorrhaging of sporting talent overseas as the international version of this domestic phenomenon.