Top 3 Sports Anime: A Deep Dive into the Best of the Genre

Christian Ashley: 00:01:14

What are our top three sports anime? We're going to be asking that question and a lot more in today's episode of Systematic Ecology. We are the priests of the geeks.

I'm your host, Christian Ashley, joined today by a fine panel of hosts all ready to explore this question. Dive in deep. Alex Matthews. How's it going, Alex?

Alex Matthews: 00:01:31

Going well

Liz Clyde: 00:01:32

How are you?

Christian Ashley: 00:01:34

I'm all right. It's a good day of doing nothing. This is distracting me from sending out resumes and I'm enjoying that fact.

We're also joined today by Elizabeth Pangalang and Clyde, co leader of the rebellion against Joshua. How's it going, Peng?

Liz Clyde: 00:01:47

It's going pretty all right. I'm also sending out resumes because I decided I wanted a new job, so I just wanted to be like you, Christian.

TJ Blackwell: 00:01:55

Don't we all?

Christian Ashley: 00:01:56

I wish you were more successful.

Liz Clyde: 00:01:58

Right. Well, I already have. I have a second interview lined up already.

Christian Ashley: 00:02:03

Oh, so you're already more successful. That's great.

Liz Clyde: 00:02:05

So sorry.

Christian Ashley: 00:02:08

Or also join. You may have heard that voice. The reason for the season. That season, of course, is June. And you love the man. His name is TJ Blackwell.

How's it going, tj?

TJ Blackwell: 00:02:19

Great, thank you.

Christian Ashley: 00:02:21

Oh, excellent.

TJ Blackwell: 00:02:23

Men's Mental Health Month and Pride Month.

Christian Ashley: 00:02:26

Ah, all about tj.

TJ Blackwell: 00:02:28

All for me.

Christian Ashley: 00:02:30

Perfect. So, ladies and gentlemen, what have you been geeking out on recently?

TJ Blackwell: 00:02:37

Night Rant. Still Elden Ring Night Rain. I expect nothing less. So good.

Liz Clyde: 00:02:44

I needed a fluffy anime to watch, so I just rewatched Kiss Him, Not Me. A cutesy little 12 episode anime. You should go watch it. And I'm planning to read the manga like, after it because it obviously, like so many.

The manga goes so much further.

Christian Ashley: 00:03:02

Perfect. Alex.

Alex Matthews: 00:03:05

I've been geeking out on south of the Night. That game is pretty good.

Christian Ashley: 00:03:09

South of the Night. I didn't know that about.

Alex Matthews: 00:03:13

It's. It's like Louisiana folklore. It deals with like, you know, it's hard to describe actually. It's just like this main character, her. There.

There was a hurricane and her mom got swept away in the house trying to find her mom.

But then while she's finding her mom, she realized that she's like a descendant of like, Weavers, where they like, tap into like, spiritual things and fight monsters and all that. So, yeah, so far it's pretty good.

Christian Ashley: 00:03:46

And that was south the night.

Alex Matthews: 00:03:47

South of Midnight.

Christian Ashley: 00:03:49

South of Midnight. Thank you.

Liz Clyde: 00:03:50

Yeah.

TJ Blackwell: 00:03:51

All right.

Christian Ashley: 00:03:52

Yeah, me, I am almost done with the Oblivion remaster. I just got to finish up the Shivering Isles part and then I don't know where I'm going to go from there. Video game wise.

Now that we've gone through that, as mentioned earlier, this is going to be another ranking episode. We're going to be going through our top three sports anime. Specifically, we're going over our criteria for why we chose what we did. But.

But before we go over that, like, just as a general question, guys, like, what is it about sports anime that makes us like them?

TJ Blackwell: 00:04:22

I don't like most of them.

Christian Ashley: 00:04:26

And why is that? What would you qualify as something that would make you like it and what doesn't? I really.

TJ Blackwell: 00:04:31

I don't know which. Why there's only a few that I do like and I really like them. I don't know what the difference is, but like Haikyuu I can't get into.

I've tried a couple times. Three horrible. Really bad. Yuri on Ice. Same deal.

Christian Ashley: 00:04:53

Wow.

TJ Blackwell: 00:04:53

But some of them, Some of them just work. I don't know.

Liz Clyde: 00:04:57

Yeah, I just really enjoy. It takes three minutes for a one second interaction of the slow mo. And then it goes to the backstory and then like his life flashes before his eye.

It's just so ridiculous. It makes me laugh.

TJ Blackwell: 00:05:11

Yeah. That. I will say that though the common trend for me is that they just have these ridiculous over the top characters.

It's always a high school student who has no business being the way he is. I love that. That's super.

Alex Matthews: 00:05:25

Yeah. You know, I never been one to.

I never thought I would like fourth anime until I watched girls basketball with my dad the other day and I got hooked on that. That's the only sports anime that I actually watched. I tried getting into Yuri on Ice, but I. Out of that first episode, it was so weird.

Like I thought we were talking about ice skating. What. What's happening?

Liz Clyde: 00:05:51

But yeah, they were going for another demographic that was an ice skating fan. Yeah, I realized that real quick.

Alex Matthews: 00:05:57

Real quick.

Liz Clyde: 00:06:00

Happy June, everyone.

Christian Ashley: 00:06:05

Yeah. For me it's. Yeah. As someone who is not the most physically fit person in the world and that's my own dang fault.

It's nice to see other people accomplish things that I'm not gonna do and to see their struggles, you know, is that I'm a Chonen guy. It's also really nice to see someone, you know, fight against, whether it be an opponent or a team or something like that is like trying to.

Or even themselves trying to become better than who they were and move beyond that. Like, oh, well, now I'm a little faster. Now I'm a little. I'VE gained a little more muscle mass or something.

That's going to give me the edge that I need to succeed on this. And it's fun to watch that process.

And, you know, all these anime are from very different worlds, so how they approach things, I like to see how a mangaka goes through that. And like, what. Why are you focusing on this? Why not that? And it's just a ton of fun.

It's wish fulfillment in a sense of man, I wish I was younger and I could do that. And that's not changing. And I'm not going to change so I can watch someone else change instead.

TJ Blackwell: 00:07:09

Yeah, I get it. Yeah.

Christian Ashley: 00:07:11

Yeah. Since we're in that general ball field, I mean, why not just ask, like, did any of us grow up playing sports or for school or anything like that?

TJ Blackwell: 00:07:21

I did. I played a few.

Liz Clyde: 00:07:23

I did. I played them all.

TJ Blackwell: 00:07:26

Yeah. Soccer.

Christian Ashley: 00:07:27

That does not surprise me one bit.

Liz Clyde: 00:07:29

Baseball, football, wrestling, tennis, gymnastics, softball, soccer, basketball. All of them.

TJ Blackwell: 00:07:40

Yeah. I tried to play volleyball for my high school. They wouldn't let me.

Liz Clyde: 00:07:44

Me too.

TJ Blackwell: 00:07:45

Yeah.

Well, they wouldn't let me do it because they either I would have had to wear the women's, you know, spandex, or they would have had to buy new shorts.

Liz Clyde: 00:07:54

No one wanted to see me in the shorts over the net. But I tried out and I didn't make the team. I don't know why I tried out. I. I just did it.

TJ Blackwell: 00:08:02

I could. I could. I was.

Christian Ashley: 00:08:04

It was a new challenge, but no.

TJ Blackwell: 00:08:05

One wanted to see me, which I guess is fair, but I don't understand.

Liz Clyde: 00:08:09

I also did track and cross country too. I forget about those.

Christian Ashley: 00:08:13

Yeah, I wasn't sliding pang with what she said. Paying sometimes reminds me of my younger sister and that they're very much, very goal oriented. Very.

There's a challenge and I'm gonna go kill that challenge because it's in my way. And it just made me laugh when she said, yeah, I did everything. And that sounds right.

Liz Clyde: 00:08:33

It was like, someone's like, you want to try this? I'm like, yeah. Like, right before this podcast, I was like, you want to come ride on my four wheeler? Okay.

So I just spent 30 minutes riding on the back of someone's four wheeler just because it was there.

Christian Ashley: 00:08:47

Alex.

Alex Matthews: 00:08:48

I did cross country for one year in high school, but that's like, that's the only sport I took seriously.

Christian Ashley: 00:08:56

Yeah. I have grown up around sports my entire life. My dad is basketball coach to this day. So that's where I really started off.

But I never actually played for him or anyone else. Because I just liked playing. I didn't like all the strategy. And here's. We're not to use this specific lineup here.

If we're facing this defense, we have to go there. If we, we have facing this offense, we have to do this man to man. It's like that means nothing to me. Just like, let me just have fun and play.

All these rules that come in, I don't want to deal with that. So I. I played a little bit of soccer when I was a kid in elementary school. Was awful at it. Same thing with baseball, awful at it.

I put a little upward basketball. It's like I did good at that. It wasn't the best by any stretch of the imagination, but it was a lot of fun.

So once I got to high school, I really stopped caring. I would play with friends and that'd be about it.

TJ Blackwell: 00:09:50

I love the competitive part. Just so that was really what it was for me. I like being good at things, so I like doing a lot of things so I can get good at them.

Liz Clyde: 00:10:00

I like the team aspect. Like, I liked the bus rides and like going out to eat and all that stuff. Just the friendships. But I also liked not being at home.

So sports got me out of the house.

TJ Blackwell: 00:10:17

Yeah.

Christian Ashley: 00:10:17

And I'm a homebody born and raised, so I never cared beyond a certain point. It's like, oh, I can stay inside and play video games or read a book or just hang out with friends somewhere else.

Now I don't need the structure of sports.

So since we're also talking about anime as well, I figured might as well go ahead and go to the question of how we were introduced to anime as a concept.

TJ Blackwell: 00:10:43

Toonami born and raised.

Liz Clyde: 00:10:48

Adult Swim.

TJ Blackwell: 00:10:50

Yep.

Alex Matthews: 00:10:51

Adult Swim.

Christian Ashley: 00:10:53

Yep. Well, it's going to be a common answer. Toonami, Adult Swim. I grew up when. And then of course, kids WB as well. Pokemon.

When that came out, I was huge into it. Four Kids Dragon Ball. Yep. I never watched that. I saw the commercials and I was like, no, I don't want to do anything about that.

So I just got into the manga later on. But yeah, the Sailor Moon Mobile Suit Gundam Wing. And then found that. Oh, they aired unedited stuff later on at night, so. Oh, that sounds cool.

That sounds edgier. That's exactly what young child me did. It's like stayed up when he wasn't supposed to and then. Then watch those channels.

Excuse me, those shows on Cartoon Network later at night. It was great.

TJ Blackwell: 00:11:40

Yeah. I think Toonami is just the most common answer. Easily Ask him between our age group.

Christian Ashley: 00:11:46

That makes perfect sense. Yeah.

TJ Blackwell: 00:11:48

There's nothing like staying up too late and all of a sudden you're watching Bleach and Eureka seven and Dead Men Wonderland and who knows what else. Yeah.

Christian Ashley: 00:11:59

Yeah. We didn't grow up in the days of Voltron and Robotech and Starblazers and all that. We got a different slice and it was pretty good.

Both slices are good, just in different. Different settings. So as mentioned, Alex actually have a top three. And I'm not trying to call her out or anything, but for the sake of what.

What goes out later on, I don't want to, like, make her feel pressured to have answers for these things.

So as we're moving on before then, I just say, do we have any, like, shout outs, honorable mentions we want to give before we actually go into our top three proper? Because we don't know. We know what everyone has. We don't know the ranking that we have it.

TJ Blackwell: 00:12:40

Megalobox.

Christian Ashley: 00:12:41

Okay.

TJ Blackwell: 00:12:43

Megalo Box is really good. It actually shares a lot in common with one of our other answers today, which I do think is interesting.

Out of the, you know, 11, 10, however many we actually ended up with that we're going to talk about, two of them are boxing.

Christian Ashley: 00:13:01

Yeah.

TJ Blackwell: 00:13:03

And I think two of them are tennis anime. They are, yes. Which is something weird to say the least. But Megalo Box deserves to be up there too. There's just only three slots.

Christian Ashley: 00:13:19

Ping or Alex.

Liz Clyde: 00:13:23

Cass. I feel like I've seen all of the sports anime, which is hilarious because I do not like watching sports in real life.

But I'll watch a sports anime all day long. Especially if there's hot guys.

Christian Ashley: 00:13:34

I was just about to make the joke.

TJ Blackwell: 00:13:36

High schoolers.

Liz Clyde: 00:13:39

Fine, they're not real tj. But yeah, I can't think of any honorable mention. Just my. The three I chose was the first three that came to mind, so I'm just ranking them.

But I mean, I did watch the ball. I mean, I watched the volleyball anime. I watched Yuri on Rice. I liked them both, though. Yeah.

Christian Ashley: 00:14:05

All right. Alec, do you have anything you want to add?

Alex Matthews: 00:14:10

I can't think of the name, but. Honorable mention. My dad really liked this one. I did watch a couple episodes of it with him. It's one about golf. I can't remember its name.

Christian Ashley: 00:14:23

Birdie's Wing.

Liz Clyde: 00:14:25

The one with the little kids, I think.

Alex Matthews: 00:14:29

I don't know.

Christian Ashley: 00:14:31

I know I haven't seen either any golf sports anyway, but that's one I know of. I.

TJ Blackwell: 00:14:36

There's. There's a lot more than you would think.

Liz Clyde: 00:14:40

There's more than you think. I just watched one about Badming. So they'll make an anime about anything.

TJ Blackwell: 00:14:46

I plan on watching that one.

Christian Ashley: 00:14:48

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. While we're looking that up, I'm going to mention Baki the Grappler. Is it really a sports anime? Kinda.

TJ Blackwell: 00:15:00

I would like to agree.

Christian Ashley: 00:15:02

Part of. Part of my criteria is I'm only selecting things that have actually finished. I don't rank things until they're done.

That's why, you know, I haven't given like a ranking officially for all of one piece or something like that. I like to take everything in the entirety of what it offers. So other things that'll be on here. I'm not saying they don't deserve to be on there.

How dare you. It's just like that's just how I personally, I'm going to rank these things.

The Megalo box as well is an excellent choice and in fact is heavily, shall we say, it's a reimagining of something that is going to be on my list later on. And then of course, Hajime no Ippo is part of mine. The only reason it's not in my top three is because it's not done the same thing with Baki.

I love them for different reasons. Hajime no Ippo takes things far more seriously.

As far as the actual sport, Baki is like whatever we're throwing up against the wall that's going to get to do. There's a caveman now who People are going to die. It's fun. That's all we need. Did you find the name of that one?

Alex Matthews: 00:15:59

I don't think it's Rising Impact.

Christian Ashley: 00:16:02

Rising Impact.

TJ Blackwell: 00:16:03

Okay.

Christian Ashley: 00:16:04

Sounds way more intense than you'd expect for golf.

TJ Blackwell: 00:16:07

I bet it's going to have a really good Nintendo Switch game. Probably that's what it sounds like. But if I. I didn't think about Baki as a sports anime. If I did, it would be here for me for sure.

Christian Ashley: 00:16:20

Yeah. I love Baki because it's stupid.

TJ Blackwell: 00:16:23

It's so.

Christian Ashley: 00:16:24

And makes no sense. And it's wonderful. Every moment. Just pure wonder. You can listen to what's new episode I did with Kevin forever ago talking about the.

The latest season, so. That's right. All right. So our top three. So we're going to go through a system.

We're going to explain what the anime is about or explain why it means so much to us personally. We're going to ask. We have a favorite character in the show and if there's anything that we do not like about it. So. So that we keep a consistent one.

Who wants to go first, second, third, fourth? I think I'll go fourth since I'm the one hosting all this. Anyone want to go first?

TJ Blackwell: 00:17:05

Yeah, I'll go first.

Christian Ashley: 00:17:07

All right.

TJ Blackwell: 00:17:09

So for my. My third favorite for now is Dogs Red. Dogs Red is super cool. It's like.

Christian Ashley: 00:17:20

So I. I'm.

TJ Blackwell: 00:17:21

I'm sure you're all familiar with like the concept of bad boy figure skater does hockey. This is that. It's awesome. Basically. Figure skater has massive fallout at a tournament. It is high school, of course, because they are. They all are.

They're all about high schoolers. Flips out, attacks a referee, gets shipped off to the low country and gets picked up by this high school hockey team because they need a new skater.

This guy sure can skate. It's kind of young. It's planned to get an anime. Not out yet, but I like hockey a lot. Dogs Red. It's really funny.

It's got the over exaggerated characters. It's just a good time.

And watching him try to adjust from the figure skating world into the hockey is really funny because it takes this elite athlete, one of the best figure skaters in Japan, and you put him on the ice with a stick and pad in a goal and suddenly he can't really do anything. So it's a lot of fun to read. Hopefully it does get animated soon. I would love to see it.

Christian Ashley: 00:18:35

So how many chapters are out, by the way?

TJ Blackwell: 00:18:39

60 or 70.

Christian Ashley: 00:18:41

Okay. That's respectable. I'm sure at some point. Yeah. They've already announced an anime adaptation.

TJ Blackwell: 00:18:46

Yeah, I believe so. Oh, it's 50.

Christian Ashley: 00:18:48

Okay.

TJ Blackwell: 00:18:49

Chapter 50 comes out.

Christian Ashley: 00:18:50

But it's like really good if they're getting one that early on. Is it weekly or monthly?

Liz Clyde: 00:18:56

I don't know.

TJ Blackwell: 00:18:56

I read it whenever I remember that I'm reading it.

Christian Ashley: 00:18:59

Fair enough.

TJ Blackwell: 00:19:02

Bi weekly, apparently.

Christian Ashley: 00:19:04

Okay.

TJ Blackwell: 00:19:06

How strange. How bizarre.

Christian Ashley: 00:19:08

There you go.

TJ Blackwell: 00:19:09

But I'm having a lot of fun with it.

Christian Ashley: 00:19:12

The bizarre one doesn't count as the sports series though. So we can't do.

TJ Blackwell: 00:19:15

Can't do JoJo's the sport is posing.

Christian Ashley: 00:19:21

They're magnificent. Yeah. So do you have a favorite character from the manga so far?

TJ Blackwell: 00:19:27

I mean, so there's like three kind of main characters and I switch between them a lot.

You've got, you know, the team captain and I don't remember his name, but he's trying his best to reconcile the team's differences with the figure skater they're trying to get to be their ace. And then you have the figure skater who's trying to adjust to this world and kind of reluctant to play hockey.

But he owes a debt to one of the brothers that are the two that run the hockey team because he sunk their goal into a lake. Yeah. Yep. They inherited from their grandpa. No, that's basically a blood debt.

Christian Ashley: 00:20:10

Okay. Is there anything that you don't like about it so far?

TJ Blackwell: 00:20:14

Not really.

Christian Ashley: 00:20:15

Okay.

TJ Blackwell: 00:20:16

I mean, obviously, like, it's not the greatest manga of all time. You know, there are authors who can better show action in motion, but I can't really fault them that, you know.

Christian Ashley: 00:20:34

Anything else you'd like to say about Dogs Red before we move on?

TJ Blackwell: 00:20:37

Definitely give it a shot if you know. I know everybody doesn't like hockey or figure skating or ice in general, but check it out.

Christian Ashley: 00:20:48

And Shonen Jump just had it was Fun series. It just unfortunately didn't get an audience like Two on Ice or something like that that was about figure skaters. It was actually pretty fun.

It just unfortunately just didn't sell enough so got away. I'm guessing this is published by someone else.

TJ Blackwell: 00:21:05

Dogs Red? Yeah. No, it's. It is.

Christian Ashley: 00:21:09

Oh, are they Jump plus?

TJ Blackwell: 00:21:14

Yes.

Christian Ashley: 00:21:15

Okay. I'll chainsaw man right now. Cool. All right, who wants to take second place? Peng or Alex?

Liz Clyde: 00:21:23

I'll go second.

Christian Ashley: 00:21:24

All right.

Liz Clyde: 00:21:25

I. Gosh, it's so hard. I guess I would put my third choice is Conqueror. No basket. The Conqueror's basketball. Not that one.

TJ Blackwell: 00:21:41

This is so hard to tell when they're tiny. There we go.

Liz Clyde: 00:21:44

That one. So I have a feeling Alex is going to be talking about this one too. I'm not sure which list she's going to ranking.

She puts it on the distill her thunder Pretty much. It's high school basketball. What's funny is this is the only reason why I know all the basketball stuff.

Whenever I had to watch a high school basketball game, I actually understood it thanks to this anime. Thank you. So pretty much it's this kid who has absolutely no present whatsoever. People just kind of see him invisible on the court.

And because of that, he seems like a phantom basketball player. So he's always like in the right spot at the right time to like set someone up for the perfect basket. So yeah, that's about it.

Alex can explain it better than me. I don't know why. I really enjoyed it and I remember it putting me on the edge of my seat, like not knowing what was going to happen.

So I really appreciated that. It wasn't like one of those like they always win type of anime.

Christian Ashley: 00:22:45

Yeah. Is there any particular reason why it, like, means so much to you?

Liz Clyde: 00:22:50

No, I remembered it. I remembered it. That's it. So, yeah, pretty much. Yeah. I thought it was cool. I like this teamwork.

There was like, I guess in middle school there was an Ace Core four, whatever Core five basketball thing, and they all went to separate high schools. And so now the Phantom dude wants to be all the other stuff. I don't know. Everyone has a special ability that they're super good at basketball.

You know, same old sports, anime type deal. We want the underdog to win. So I have the least to say about this one. So it's the third. What were you saying?

Christian Ashley: 00:23:25

Yeah, you have a favorite character from the show.

Liz Clyde: 00:23:28

Yeah, the little short white dude, however you say his name.

Alex Matthews: 00:23:33

Kuroko.

Christian Ashley: 00:23:36

So memorable. You can say his name off. Off the beaten path. Excellent.

So is there anything about the show, do you remember that he was like, ah, I'm not big on that.

Liz Clyde: 00:23:47

Nope, nope, nope, nope. I probably watched this show like at least five years ago.

So the fact that when I was thinking of a top three sports anime and this one came to mind, it was very rememberable. Just tell you all about it.

Christian Ashley: 00:24:04

All right, next up, Alex.

Alex Matthews: 00:24:10

Yeah, I'm basically going to piggyback off paying because basketball was the only sports anime I've watched all the way through.

And yeah, she basically said everything's about this high schooler who has no presence on the court and he uses that ability to like, uplift his other teammates and all that. Yes, that's. That's basically it. He's from a middle school team called Generation of Miracles. They're all stupid, good at the game.

Each got their own individual rah rah, you know?

TJ Blackwell: 00:24:46

Yeah, yeah. Kuroko's basketball is. Is special. I do think I was going to put it in my honorable mentions, but I knew they wanted to talk about it. It's.

It's something else, man. The world that Kuroko's basketball takes place in is hilarious. Because I'm.

I'm pretty sure at the end of the series, like, none of these dudes make it. Not one of them. Every NBA is just so much better than these guys in high school in Japan.

And they're like, at this point, the power scaling in Kuroko no basketball is ridiculous because, you know, people like Steph Curry are already ridiculous basketball players in real life. So in Kirko Nevaski, you just have to assume that he's literally never missed anything ever.

Christian Ashley: 00:25:39

Okay, so I think something does need to be explained here. So our good buddy mutual friend Joshua no got this idea together for a sports anime episode. He put Alex there.

I said, oh well that must mean that she's watched a lot, you know, me assuming things without actually asking questions. So that's on me too. But mostly we're gonna put it on Joshua. So I thought, well, instead of a jacket general almost turn into a top three.

So I'm sorry, Alex, blame Joshua. That's how I'm going to interpret events. And if he cuts this out of the show, he's a coward. He deserves whatever comes to him.

TJ Blackwell: 00:26:17

He won't.

Alex Matthews: 00:26:21

It's all good because I'm learning a lot more about like different words animes too. So like I'm already right written down some of the things you guys said of what to watch and I've been.

Liz Clyde: 00:26:32

On so many episodes, Alex, I, I was like, I don't even know why I'm here, but I'm here. So welcome.

TJ Blackwell: 00:26:38

Sometimes we just like Reddit 3.

Christian Ashley: 00:26:43

There you go. So my number three is going to be I shield 21.

This is an American football manga slash anime from a Japanese perspective, obviously in a country that doesn't really, especially at the time it was being written, respect American football that much and has since grown a little more. You show a little more high schools that are involved, especially since this was published and aired.

So the basic concept of the show is you got our boy C who is very, very short. The. You will never forget that because they will always bring it up for the rest of the series.

He's a short guy and he gets bullied constantly and he gets bullied by his soon to be one of his best friends who wants to have a football team. His name is Yoichi Hirama and he has decided psychopath that he is, that he doesn't need people's consent to do this.

He's just going to find people that are good at various things and then he's going to force them on a team, whether through blackmail, extortion or shooting a gun at them. It's all very, it's done in a funny way. It's not done in the sense of they're actually in peril or anything like that.

It's more like the ridiculousness of the ideas that there's a gun toting maniac in Japan someplace that we. You would not expect. He's acting very American in many respects throughout the show. And it's the concept of, well, you're short.

And one thing that's a part of that is kind of in A similar way to Kuroko. No basket.

There's moments where it's harder to find him because he's so short, because he can go through the offensive line and stuff like that in a way and weave through them that other people won't be able to get to him as quickly. And he's super fast. He may be short, but he's also incredibly quick.

So if you don't get to him quickly as their running back, then he's going to score. And it's part of the show too, that they don't have a kicker for a while.

So there's going to be multiple times when they're in games and there's just. They just score six points and they have no field goal after that. And it's learning as well, like who. Who else is going to join the team.

How Senate kind of becomes a little better through that regard of learning to actually enjoy the sport that he was forced into.

And he takes on kind of the Persona of Ice Shield 21 because one of the things Hirama does is make it seem like he's actually played at Notre Dame and is now somehow playing high school football in Japan.

And so he wears the eye shield in front of him to disguise his appearance so no one at school knows that it's him outside of a select group of people. And it's all the hijinks that come from that. The weird and quirky schools that they. They pretty much fight with on the football field. It's a really.

It's a ton of fun. I highly recommend it. But as far as characters, I'm gonna have to pick Yerima. He is an absolute blast.

He is the fun kind of sociopath that you're glad you don't know in real life. But for the purposes of watching a fictional show, he's just enjoyable to watch. He's unhinged. He will do whatever it takes to get what he wants.

And it's so enjoyable to see him just walk through his process, obviously think, oh, thank God he's not actually real. And along the way he kind of mellows out. And he and Senna's best friend, oh gosh, what is her name? I can't remember.

She becomes like the manager for the team and they start kind of developing this little romance.

It's not focused on really, because Shonen, but that there's enough there for someone like Pank to maybe get a little excited, but not enough to where I would recommend you go there for that romance exclusively now.

TJ Blackwell: 00:30:42

Yeah, but High Shield 21 is really cool. It's Murata's first work. I think so. Like, if you know, one punch.

Christian Ashley: 00:30:49

I think so. Yes.

TJ Blackwell: 00:30:50

This is. This is him.

And it's just as goofy because if you look up I shield 21 and you see pictures of Haruma, you're just going to assume he's the villain because he's got, you know, the spiky hair, the sharp teeth, maniacal smile. A gun. A gun. Just straight up a gun. Super silly. I've seen clips I haven't, like, committed to watching it.

I. I do want to, because I am a fan of Murata's work. But I've heard some good things about.

Christian Ashley: 00:31:24

Memoria is her name, so things I don't like. It drags a little bit towards the end. There's some.

If you're into romantic resolutions between certain people, it doesn't really focus on them too much. So it gets one of those classic shonen things of, if this were any other manga, they'd actually be dating.

But for the sake of stuff like that, we don't focus on it because young boys don't like that.

But like, if you want something that's super ridiculous that to an extent takes football seriously even when it's being ridiculous, I mean, this is a good way to go. It's a fine show. So those were our number threes. It's time for our second pick. So tj, have at it.

TJ Blackwell: 00:32:12

Smart. So for me, number two is Hajime no Evo. Absolute classic. Christian mentioned earlier that it is still ongoing.

That's because it's one of the longest ongoing series ever.

Christian Ashley: 00:32:31

Ever.

TJ Blackwell: 00:32:32

It started in: 1990

Christian Ashley: 00:32:37

Thereabouts.

TJ Blackwell: 00:32:38

87. Like something ridiculous.

I thought it was finished until a few months ago when I was doing a little research to find out, you know, I was looking up One Piece stats and I saw Hajime no Ippo on a list above it and I was like, oh, okay, that's ridiculous. But Hajime no Ippo is special. It's about Ippo. He wants to be champion of the world. That's it. That's not it, but that's the gist.

There's well over a thousand chapters, and there's a lot that goes on over the course of this year. Silly. It's goofy. It is. It'll get extremely serious, intense.

You know, just going with Ippo through like the throes of a career as boxing can be scary. And, you know, you don't know if he's going to quit. Watching him become a boxer because at the Start of the series, he's not.

He's just not in any regard. But he wants to be. He wants to make something. He wants to be like, you know, people. He looks up. So he becomes this boxer.

And I think what really makes it special is like, a Shida no Joe and Megalo Fox. And really all of the good combat sports anime is he can lose. And he will. And he does.

Christian Ashley: 00:34:04

Yeah.

TJ Blackwell: 00:34:05

Sometimes horribly. And so do his friends. Sometimes. It's just sad, really sad. But the art is great, especially for its time.

The dynamism that is portrayed in the panels and the anime, to an extent, not as. Not as clean, I don't think, because of limitations of the time. But Hajime no Ippo is so special. It's absolutely hilarious.

It is a knockout riot sometimes, but it is so worth watching. I would recommend absolutely everybody to check it out at least a little bit. And then once you get into it, you're. You're gonna get hooked.

You're gonna have to commit to watching the rest of it, unfortunately.

Christian Ashley: 00:34:53

Quality pick here. I list my reasons why it's not in here, but if it were done, it would be very close to the top. Like, great show.

Great motivations for EPOs being like, hey, he's just nobody, you know, Classic. You know, he gets bullied. What? Learns how to stand up for himself a little bit. You've got what. What's his. The older guys.

TJ Blackwell: 00:35:18

Yeah. I keep wanting to say Takamura, but I feel like I'm wrong and I just didn't want to say.

Christian Ashley: 00:35:23

He is a riot. I love this, man. It's like, you know, you could easily feel like an invincible character as time goes on, but, like, no, it shows depth to him.

Like, how. What it takes to win and how he inspires Ippo to be a little better for himself. It's a great series. Do you have, like, a favorite character?

TJ Blackwell: 00:35:43

Oh, it's epo, obviously.

Christian Ashley: 00:35:46

I mean. I mean, solid. It's not often that you pick the main character, but it was a solid one.

TJ Blackwell: 00:35:52

Yeah, well, I'm a short guy. I'm a short guy. I'm also a big Kuroko.

Christian Ashley: 00:36:03

Now, is there anything about Hajime no ipa that you're not big on at all?

TJ Blackwell: 00:36:12

So the same way that Wit is about to start remaking One piece while it's still ongoing, I think. I think Ippo deserves the same. That's my least favorite part.

Christian Ashley: 00:36:23

the last one was, what, like,: 2006

TJ Blackwell: 00:36:34

2009 but it's old. I know that much.

Christian Ashley: 00:36:36

Yeah, but that's a, that's a really solid one to go down. Anything else you'd like to say about it?

TJ Blackwell: 00:36:47

The Dempsey Roll might be one of my favorite signature attacks in anything. I I I'll put it up there with the Turtle wave. The Kamehameha I It's, it's so cool. And it's, it's just funny.

It's so much funny from like, from a boxing perspective. It's ridiculous. It's so fun. It's like I'm just gonna stand here the rotate a lot and generate enough power to knock this guy out. That's hilarious.

That does not work.

Christian Ashley: 00:37:19

All right, next up, hang.

Liz Clyde: 00:37:24

Mine would be Blue lock as number two. Soccer.

Christian Ashley: 00:37:28

Okay.

Liz Clyde: 00:37:31

Football. Depending on you. So this is probably one of the newer sports anime being discussed.

So this is pretty much Japan really just thinks that soccer and they would like to develop this all star team so we can. What is it called? The US Open. Right, what they usually do.

TJ Blackwell: 00:37:51

No.

Liz Clyde: 00:37:54

What'S it called? No, what, what is it called? World Cup. Okay. That was it. So pretty much they want to start breeding these high schoolers for.

I mean that's exactly what it is to be like this amazing team. And so they have, it's Japan. So they have this amazing state of the art technology. This guy named Ego, which makes sense.

He pretty much takes the best high schoolers there are. Like he, he handpicks them. But they're all strikers. But we would know them as forward. So they're all the shooters, the gold scorers.

And so pretty much he takes all the scores and puts them through this crazy boot camp to get the best team there is. And so we follow this guy. What is his name? I can't remember. Obviously I do really good with Isagi. Obviously.

I learned the names very well when I watch anime. So we pretty much follow this one guy who it starts off with him losing a game with.

But he lost the game because he passed the ball to someone and the person missed. And so then he's devastated. And it pretty much grooms him to be the best striker. You got to get in the zone pretty much.

And yeah, pretty much learn to rely on your ego and want it bad enough. And so you kind of learn a lot of other characters as well. But not all the characters make it that you love and learn.

So you really just don't know who's going to make it. Doesn't which is kind of nice. And then near the end, if you guys watch it, I won't spoil it too much.

But they wanted to discontinue the program as like, well, we'll take my team and put them against the Japan actual national soccer team and we'll see how this is going to go. I'm not going to tell you how it went. You have to watch. But it had me hook, line and sinker.

And even though I am a grown woman confident in my marriage, all the high school boys were very attractive and I enjoyed watching them.

TJ Blackwell: 00:39:57

Peng's gonna get.

Liz Clyde: 00:40:00

No, I am not. Because they're not real.

Christian Ashley: 00:40:04

At least she's honest.

TJ Blackwell: 00:40:06

No Blue Lock is special. Blue Lock really is so good. Probably the best new modern sports anime. Even as it's inconsistent as the production has gotten recently.

Liz Clyde: 00:40:18

It is great. But I love watching on TikTok. These really amazing soccer players will actually do the moves that these soccer players have done in the anime.

Meaning, even though it seems physically impossible, the anime is actually realistic in its sense. You know what I mean? It's not like this giant, like basketball doing this impossible twist and slow form or anything like that.

Like, these are legit moves that can happen if you're good enough, which I appreciate as a soccer player. Yeah, I was a right defender.

TJ Blackwell: 00:40:53

It feels similar because they do kind of do the Kirko no basket thing of like they each basically have a superpower, but it's a lot more realistic in blue block and they. It's a lot more realistic, but they exaggerate it more so it feels just as ridiculous. But it's not like Asagi has metavision. That's field sense.

That's just a thing that you develop over time as you play the game. And he just has a really, really good one.

Liz Clyde: 00:41:25

So I love it when like they kind of like act like just crazy psychopaths on the field and they like get in the zone and I like, it's just so. Yeah, so crazy. But I mean, if you are in the zone. I remember someone. I didn't read this book, but someone mentioned it.

It was one of the really good basketball players. And he wrote a book. Probably.

I don't know, it could have been Jordan, but he pretty much wrote a book about how to be the best and you have to walk on other people.

Like you have to like, not care, like who's around you and you have to claw your way to the top and be better and walk on people, you know, not being a jerk about it. But that was just the reality of, like, becoming number one because become. There's only one number one, you know.

But someone told me about, like that book and it. I saw a lot of what they've described in that book into this anime. Because if everyone's striving to do a goal and being number one, it kind of.

It worked. But you have to watch it. Just go watch it now, right now. Turn us off and go watch it in like 20 minutes when you're done with this episode.

TJ Blackwell: 00:42:37

Yeah, it is absolutely ridiculous. They go fully insane on the pitch. It's insane.

Christian Ashley: 00:42:45

It's a fun series. It takes itself super seriously. Also in its ridiculousness.

The idea that Japan, or just that, would have enough money just for this one specific position on the team.

We're going to have an entire organization that's basically battle royale without everyone shooting each other to figure out who's the best of the best to truly raise the next generation of supreme soccer players. It's. It's a stupid, like, motivation, but it's so fun that, like, you don't care. Like this guy.

It doesn't matter that that makes no sense whatsoever in reality. It's just accept what's happening on screen. It's not my favorite by any stretch of the imagination, but it's a lot of fun. So pained.

Is there anything about it that you're not big on?

Liz Clyde: 00:43:33

There's no romance because there's just no females. There's no time for it. They're literally like all locked in. In this, like, not a prison, but pretty much this concentration camp.

TJ Blackwell: 00:43:44

It's a prison.

Liz Clyde: 00:43:45

Yeah, I. Soccer. They live, eat, breathe, soccer, dream. Soccer, everything. Soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer.

So there's no romance, but I'm okay with it, honestly. I think my character, the guy with the red hair who's really fast, I think he's very.

Christian Ashley: 00:44:06

Go ahead, dj.

TJ Blackwell: 00:44:07

I think my favorite part of Blue Lock is when they meet the real life professionals. And usually they're parodies. Sometimes they're really close parodies, but they're parodies of real life professionals soccer players.

And they're just taking these kids so seriously, like actual 17, 16 year olds. And it's like Lionel Messi is like, oh, I'm gonna kill you. I'm gonna devour you right now.

Christian Ashley: 00:44:34

It's not quite as bad as that was. That one south park episode with the peewee hockey plays against the Detroit Red Wings or whatever it is. And it should get obliterated.

Yeah, but the same intent is behind a lot of that.

TJ Blackwell: 00:44:46

Yeah, but the hockey Game is based on a real event.

Christian Ashley: 00:44:53

Perfect.

TJ Blackwell: 00:44:54

Yeah.

Christian Ashley: 00:44:56

All right. Anything else for Blue Lock? All right, Alex, would you have anything to add?

Alex Matthews: 00:45:04

But I will be watching this Blue Lock show.

Liz Clyde: 00:45:07

Yes.

Alex Matthews: 00:45:09

Because I have heard of it. I didn't realize.

Liz Clyde: 00:45:13

But we got her.

Alex Matthews: 00:45:17

Yeah, you got me.

Christian Ashley: 00:45:19

Yeah. As. As someone who does not care one bit about soccer, I care when it's this show exclusively.

So I will never be watching a World cup or anything, but this is fun because it just heightens up the ridiculousness in like a serious fashion. It's a weird mixing of the two, but it's really good. All right, so for my number two pick, I'm going to bring up Aim for the Ace.

This is a tennis manga from the 70s and 80s that was adapted in the 70s and 80s, an anime. And the weird thing is, before I'd even watched this, I had pretty much already watched this. And there's a reason for that.

It's because of a little show called Gunbuster.

Gunbuster is a mecha anime where pretty much it is a total, complete ripoff of everything that happens in this series, except there are giant mecha involved and aliens. And it's. It's so, so fun. It's obvious. I said it tongue in cheek. There's. It's very influenced by this.

The, like, the official title for Gunbuster is Aim for the Top or something like that in reference tooths to show which is, you know, Aim for the Ace.

TJ Blackwell: 00:46:33

It's Aim for the Apex.

Christian Ashley: 00:46:36

But yeah, something like that. And you can tell, like, Hidekiano and Gainax were very heavily influenced by this series because a lot of the same strokes happen there.

And this doesn't make him a hack or anything like that.

It's just when you're clearly influenced by something like they go full out, they let you know immediately if you've actually watched the show and I hadn't.

And when I was watching this show for the first time, I was going, wait a minute, I've seen this exact same thing happen before with different character names. They're having a love triangle with their coach. They're having messed up feelings about all this stuff.

And yet it's also part of the time, let me put it that way, where this wasn't as frowned upon like it should be as we look at it now. So that's definitely part of it. So if you can get past that hurdle, it's a lot better. And if you can't, I don't blame you.

So I. I saw Alex's reaction. I had which is the right reaction. That's the reaction you're supposed to have to hearing that information.

TJ Blackwell: 00:47:33

Yeah, I'd never. This was the only one that I had never heard of. This is like ancient history.

Christian Ashley: 00:47:42

So the basic premise is you've got, you know, girls tennis team in high school.

Our main character, Hiromi, is just trying to be good because she wants to impress, like, the girl who's ahead of her, who's named Reika, but everyone kind of calls her Madame Butterfly because she just has, like, this noble kind of upbringing and spirit to her. Like, every girl looks up to her, wants to be her.

And eventually it gets to the point where a new coach comes in and reshuffles things and causes Reika to kind of lose her position on a team and Hiromi to be rising up instead.

And everyone's outraged by it because she's clearly not as talented as her, but he sees something in her and wants to, like, progressively make her better and encourages the both of them by D ranking Reika and then up ranking Hiromi, however the heck that works. And it's a ton of fun of just exploring not only tennis, but also the interplay between the characters and what they're wrestling with as well.

You know, when, you know, a sudden a character dies in the midst of the show, that's got a huge ramifications for what happens afterward and how you. You pick yourself back up after dealing with grief and striving to become the best. Despite all that, it's an extremely fun show. I would say my.

My favorite character is actually the coach. You know, outside of that one thing we mentioned, there are.

There's aspects of him I really enjoy where he's really tough and he will do things and he won't explain himself off the bat because he expects you to put a little work and effort into figuring out what his motives are. And then when you actually do that, he'll show more respect for you and then eventually explain things versus people who just kind of give up.

And it's like, well, we weren't ever going to get along with to begin with, so he's real fun. Like I said, it is a product of its time. I'm not really big. I don't like the relationship between the coach and.

Yeah, he's not that much older than them, but it doesn't make it right just putting that out there and how that's handled. There's jealousy that's involved in all that, and character interplays that happen as a result of that.

That are important to the series, but I wish they'd have done it in a better fashion. So there is that. But ultimately, overall, like, as someone, I enjoy tennis, like, once again, I never cared enough to actually train.

So it's nice to see someone who cares enough to go about and do these things and see someone who knows she's not good enough, but yet get propelled forward to become good enough to be better than who you actually think you are. So aim for the Ace. Excellent series. That's our number twos for top three sports animes. Now time for our number one, TJ and Blow Us Away.

TJ Blackwell: 00:50:35

Ping Pong. The animation. I understand viewers that it may look goofy, it may look silly.

However, I think artistically this is one of the best animations I've ever seen. It is unrepentantly dedicated to its style.

And that's something you have to respect because if you look at it, you're like, wow, this kind of looks horrible.

Christian Ashley: 00:51:07

Rough.

TJ Blackwell: 00:51:07

Get over it. Get over it. It's intentional. It's intentional. And I really, really got used to it over the course of not only the manga, but also the anime.

And it's basically, at its core, two childhood best friends who, you know, grow up best friends, go to high school together, join the ping pong club. Their names are Smile and Peco. Smile is the main character. They call him that because he does not Smile. Hilarious. Hilarious.

But they join the ping pong team, and Smile is not really dedicated to it. He's very naturally gifted. Peiko is sort of the opposite. Heiko really wants to be the best, and he really enjoys being better than people. He's not.

He's not a practicer. He tries to coast by on his natural skill. And Smile's not like that. Smile is much, much more naturally skilled, but he's also willing to work for it.

So that's kind of the dynamic we have here.

And then as they get into high school, they find out they are not the big dogs that they were, you know, their ping pong club down the street from their house. So the series is about them trying to win the national champion and for a reason that I never really understood.

Wong, one of the main antagonists for part of the series is Chinese. I don't think he should be in the Japanese national high school championship.

Christian Ashley: 00:52:40

That is an immigrant or anything.

TJ Blackwell: 00:52:42

I don't think so. I'm pretty sure he lives in China or he may have been sent to Japan as punishment.

That might be because he didn't do well enough in China, which I Like a lot, actually, as a theme, because Japan and China famously, very, very combative against each other over the sport of ping pong. And China is absolutely dominant. So I do kind of wish Wang had more a role in the story, even though he really did do quite a lot.

He motivated Pico and Smile to actually train and practice more and become good enough to be at the national championship. But it's. The scope is smaller than it would seem. The story feels very intimate all the way through.

And I think that's really impressive when you're doing, like, effectively. It is a team sport. It's not really a team sport, but it really is at this level. And I think that's hard to nail down generally for a sports anime.

And I think ping pong does it fantastically. And really every time I watch it, I'm left with just a sense of, wow, that was. That was phenomenal. Also, I love ping pong. I am slightly biased.

It's my favorite sport to play.

Christian Ashley: 00:54:09

It's fun. Yeah. This is the only one that I haven't actually seen anything of. I know it exists, but hearing TJ kind of hype it up, I mean, can't say no to him.

You can't have to check it out later on.

TJ Blackwell: 00:54:22

You do, and I get it, it's ugly. But just watch it get past that and you'll. You'll be. You'll be involved.

Christian Ashley: 00:54:32

So do you have a favorite character in the show?

TJ Blackwell: 00:54:34

Oh, Smile.

Alex Matthews: 00:54:36

Well, it's.

TJ Blackwell: 00:54:37

It's between Smile and Peco, but the resolution of their character arcs. I think Smiles is a lot better because Smile, famously nonchalant. Actually is nonchalant a bad way. He's apathetic.

And he learns to, like, have that passion for ping pong again throughout the series. And that's what allows him to actually win the national championship is he becomes passionate again. And so it's.

Christian Ashley: 00:55:10

You already mentioned what you didn't like about it. So unless you have something else you want to add, we'll go to. Go ahead.

TJ Blackwell: 00:55:17

The little details in ping pong are just so good.

You can tell the author, like, really knows table tennis because each, each individual player has their own completely individual style of table tennis.

And you can tell, like, the teams that you see, you'll know their coach's style because the team will try and copy pieces of their coach's style, which is something that's really interesting to notice in real life competitors. Which also applies to tennis, if you don't know. But I love that they've got, you know, the different ways to hold a paddle.

They're all really well represented. It's just little details like that. I love them so well.

Christian Ashley: 00:56:02

Okay, Peng, your number one favorite sports anime of all time.

Liz Clyde: 00:56:08

It has to be for nostalgia. Nostalgia sake. That was hard to say. Prince of Tennis. I remember watching it on Toonami.

I looked forward to watching it every single week whenever he went off to be in America. And then like they came back with another season. Adult me was so happy.

So pretty much Princess Tennis, which is very, I guess back in that time I was early high school. But it's a bunch of middle schoolers. But they do not seem like middle schoolers.

Okay, so I am not going to talk about any of the attraction levels because I am a mature grown woman and these are middle schoolers. And I do have a line. And this is it. So this is a middle school.

TJ Blackwell: 00:56:57

The line is 12.

Liz Clyde: 00:56:59

Stop. So this is a. But remember, I started watching problematic people. I started watching this anyway at the right age, at the correct age.

So younger me very much enjoyed the eye candy. Older me enjoyed the nostalgia. Okay, okay. So pretty much the middle school here is, I think seventh, eighth, and ninth grades.

So pretty much a seventh grader, or our first year in this case. Ryoma Etchison is coming from America and he's pretty much a tennis prodigy. His dad was super famous, never lost.

The match disappeared, and he's like, you know, the. The golden child. So it's pretty much Ryoma completely dominating tennis. Like he doesn't lose. He has. He. He has the biggest advantage.

But as he, you know, plays more and more, he does get a couple of like, hard matches. And so it's kind of. It is disappointing as like, because you expect him to win. It's not like the hold your breath type of anime, but I just loved it.

I love the teamwork. I loved all the ridiculousness of it. And so when I think of sports anime, I have to choose this one. Because I also loved the romance.

My little Tweeny heart. Even though there's not romance, there is romance. And I read all the fan fiction of Ryoma Echison and Sakuno Ryuzaki.

So this is another reason why this has to be number one. Because even though the anime is old, I read so much fan fiction. It was just ridiculous.

Like probably if you go to fanfiction.net I read every single one.

TJ Blackwell: 00:58:52

Did you watch the remake?

Liz Clyde: 00:58:54

I started to watch the remake and it's still on my to watch list. But because it was just because of business and stuff like that, I Do not have time to sit down and watch it in Japanese. So I started it.

I'm not sure where it's at now. And then I was like, you know what I should do? Because this is my personality.

I started rewatching all the Prince of Tennis so I could just go straight into the remake. And then I got distracted and I forgot I was doing that until.

Christian Ashley: 00:59:22

You have a favorite character from the show.

Liz Clyde: 00:59:24

Yes. Fuji Senpai. He is the one that is kind of like a secret status, if you will. He likes pupils. Well, it's never. It's, like, implied. So he's the one.

He's the oldest senpai, third year. He's always smiling, but, like, when he gets mad, he has an evil glint in his eye. And he actually enjoys watching other people suffer.

Don't know why I love him. And, yeah, I have a problem.

TJ Blackwell: 00:59:53

Yeah, at least one.

Liz Clyde: 00:59:56

I have multiple problems.

Christian Ashley: 00:59:58

But the police are on their way.

Liz Clyde: 01:00:00

Correct? They cannot arrest you for 2D anime characters. As long as I keep it 2D, I'm keeping it 2D. Okay, guys.

Christian Ashley: 01:00:17

And check out the husbanda video that Pang and I did a month back. At some point, we're going to be doing a waifu video, and I'm going to be having to say the exact same thing she's having to say. So my.

There's no double standard here.

Liz Clyde: 01:00:28

My husband knows he's the only 3D guy for me, but 2D, I have a lot of. A lot of husbandos.

TJ Blackwell: 01:00:35

14 doesn't stand a chance.

Liz Clyde: 01:00:37

He does stand a chance. He's the only 3D guy for me, so that's saying a lot.

TJ Blackwell: 01:00:42

There's a lot of 2D guys. True. Better watch out for flat Stanley. Wlad. Stanley's gonna slide under his door one day.

Christian Ashley: 01:00:50

I'm gonna stop myself before I say anything. All right. Is there anything you don't like about it?

Liz Clyde: 01:00:57

Yes. I would love to see more romance between Ryoma Etchison and Sakura Ryuzaki. But obviously he is a boy who has one thing on his mind, which is tennis.

So you can't fault him for so much. But he does. There is a couple of episodes where, like, you know, he helps her out, gets her tennis rackets restrung, or like, he has to destress.

And so they, like, played in the arcade. So there's like, a few moments there.

Christian Ashley: 01:01:22

Okay. All right. Alex, anything you want to add before we go to the last one?

Alex Matthews: 01:01:31

I mean. No, not really.

Christian Ashley: 01:01:34

Okay.

TJ Blackwell: 01:01:34

You should condemn a little. I mean, yeah, you should condemn Pang a little.

Alex Matthews: 01:01:43

Well, the Reason why I kept quiet was because I'm kind of like her with Kirko's basket.

Liz Clyde: 01:01:51

One of me.

Alex Matthews: 01:01:52

One of me with Kuriko's basketball. I did, like, find a lot of the characters attractive, and I had to constantly remind myself, like, oh, wait, these are high schoolers.

I need to calm down.

Christian Ashley: 01:02:04

Yes.

Alex Matthews: 01:02:04

But then another part of me was like, they don't exist.

Christian Ashley: 01:02:06

They're.

Alex Matthews: 01:02:07

They're not real. So.

Christian Ashley: 01:02:08

And to be fair, it'd be really different if they were actually real.

Alex Matthews: 01:02:11

Oh, yeah.

TJ Blackwell: 01:02:12

To be completely fair, in Kuroko's basketball, those are not high schools.

Alex Matthews: 01:02:19

They are not.

TJ Blackwell: 01:02:20

Those are grown men.

Alex Matthews: 01:02:22

And that. That's one thing that also kept tripping me up, because they're not built like middle schoolers or high schoolers.

TJ Blackwell: 01:02:27

No. Like the dude. What? I don't even remember his name. With the purple hair. He's. He's six four.

Christian Ashley: 01:02:32

Yeah.

Alex Matthews: 01:02:35

They're just. They're massive compared to all the other characters in the show. So.

Christian Ashley: 01:02:41

Yeah.

Alex Matthews: 01:02:42

That's why I kept quiet, though.

Christian Ashley: 01:02:44

Yeah. Yeah. There are definitely people who take it too far. We're just making fun for the sake of making fun. We know they're not going to do anything.

It's just sillier to say, you know, we're calling the police on them. Even though fan fiction.

Liz Clyde: 01:02:58

We do a lot of things, but that was fan fiction.

Christian Ashley: 01:03:03

When we get to that waifu video, eventually we rank those. It's going to happen to me, too. And it's okay because we don't double standard here. Everyone gets sent to the police equally here.

All right, now my number one sports anime of all time is going to be a Shita no Joe Slash, Tomorrow's Joe. This is also an older anime.

It is the one that Megalo Box is a reimagining of in the sense that it's built off of similar premises, but they instead go a little more futuristic with things. They do their own thing, and they do an excellent job with it. And I saw Megalom Box first. Yeah.

Then when I was going through my list of anime and then going chronologically to watch all the things that have been subbed on websites that definitely are legit and where you should go, I stumbled upon this one and I was like, okay, well, it's got a hundred some episodes, and then a second season is more. It's like, do I really want to do it? I'll give it a couple episodes. Episode one suckered me in. We've got our boy Joe.

He is a rapscallion of the highest Order. He's a drifter, always hot headed, getting into fights with people, stealing and in a process, an older boxing coach, an Xboxer himself.

If you, if you're listening to the podcast, you can't see what TJ put down. We do not support piracy. Piracy is wrong. So there's that. Yesa but. And he notices Joe in the fight and goes, oh, you've clearly got some talent.

And Don Pay. The coach tries to instruct Joe, but Joe is a wild stallion. He can't be broken. And it's very hard early on to like Joe. And that's part of the.

What it's going for is like he's not a likable character off the bat and he's constantly rude to everyone.

He's constantly getting the fights and like everyone who gives him something nice, he kind of doesn't really backstab him, but he doesn't really play nice with everyone. And then as a result of his actions, he gets sent to prison.

And on this prison, which is basically Japanese Alcatraz, he meets a fellow prisoner there and then Yokishi, who's bigger than him, beats him up and they kind of become rivals and Dante ends up coming there to kind of like coach the prisoners, give him like boxing as a way to like do something with themselves.

And Rikishi and Joe kind of come to the point where they're in different weights and they're going to have to figure out how to solve their differences later on. And it's a huge, wonderful bit of rivalry between them.

As you know, they're figuring out the sport as Joe is kind of is doing his own thing, learning to be a little better of a person, learning to actually appreciate the people around them, being nicer to them. It's a very slow process because my boy's dull, but eventually he gets there.

And going through his process of eventually having his rematch with Rikishi, was it all worth it? And where does he actually stand in the boxing world? This is one of the best out there. This, it's in my top 10 overall.

I think it's like seven or eight, maybe even six. I'd have to look it up again. That list has changed since the last time. I actually updated it. You've got everything you need here.

You've got some tight characterization, you got some very fun world building. You got some nice boxing, the cross counter. I will never forget that until I die because it's just used so effectively here. It's his ultimate move.

It's his Kamehameha, his Dempsey role, as it were, and he does a great job. I don't know the manga's name, but spectacular work through all this.

Now, in regards to questions, I'm actually going to pick Joe as my favorite character. Which is odd because I said it before. I normally don't pick the main character as my favorite.

Not that I have some vendetta against them, it's just they're not always the most interesting person to me. But Joe is someone I hate. At the very beginning, he is a bad guy. He doesn't. He's not good to people. But then along the way, he starts.

The ice kind of starts to melt and you get a little deeper into who he is and why he is the way he is and how he interacts with people, how he loves the kids around him, his friends. And his goal to become a better boxer, too. He goes through an incredible arc and showing the. The struggles of what it takes to actually be a boxer.

Because you get punched in the face a bunch of times, you're not going to be in the best state of health. Especially when this was being written, you know, in and drawn in the 60s, dude.

TJ Blackwell: 01:07:52

Yeah, you're. As a boxer, you're doing like 60 fights. Like, it's like. It's like you're like.

Just look up any boxer from the 60s and their record is going to have a fight number that is in the hundreds. Almost every.

Christian Ashley: 01:08:07

It's ridiculous. But that's sports. There's not a single sport out there that has always treated its athletes well. And boxing's one of the worst these days.

TJ Blackwell: 01:08:16

These days, a boxer will end his career with maybe 50 fights. Yeah, it was insane.

Christian Ashley: 01:08:25

So you see kind of the repercussions of doing that in him and why he does what he does. It's so much fun. What I don't like about it, if you're into slow burns, you're not. Excuse me. If you're not into slow Burns, this is a slow burn.

And I've seen people drop it off, you know, three, 10, 20 episodes in, and I get it because it's taking its sweet time, but you need that sweet time to be taken. And if you're not for that, that's nothing wrong with you. Go and watch something else.

Not everyone can commit themselves to an ANIME that's over 100 episodes long, especially with some of that as filler. I get it. So if you're not into that, go in peace. But this is my number one. Guys, do we have anything else you want to say before we head to.

TJ Blackwell: 01:09:06

The wrap up, I will say I did not want to spoil anything about ping pong the animation because it's very short. So I think if it's interesting to you, you should check it out.

I will say it has a lot in common with Hajime no Ippo and Ashida no Joe and even Blue Lock.

Christian Ashley: 01:09:29

Okay.

TJ Blackwell: 01:09:30

So I mean, like, the person you want to win doesn't always win.

Christian Ashley: 01:09:36

Yeah. If it's rough, it's real. It happens. Yeah. So we also going to have a special bonus question today for our patrons, captivate supporters and the like.

If we had to coach for a player or team for one of these anime, who or what would it be for and why? So considered, as we're heading to the end here, does anyone have any recommendations they'd like to offer the audience?

TJ Blackwell: 01:10:03

I have three.

Christian Ashley: 01:10:05

Okay.

TJ Blackwell: 01:10:06

Rewind this episode. Play it straight through. Those are my three.

Christian Ashley: 01:10:12

Okay. Yeah. Boost does numbers.

TJ Blackwell: 01:10:16

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The recommendation is just this episode, actually. Thank you. But really, really, just try one. Sports anime.

It doesn't even have to be one that we listed here. Listen to one.

Christian Ashley: 01:10:30

There's others. I happen to think of that one as like burning kabaddi or something like that. It's for a sport called kabaddi, which I didn't know existed.

It's like 12 episodes. It's fun. It's like learning a whole new thing in front of my eyes watching that one. It's not the best thing in the world, but it was fun.

I'd check it out if I were you guys. That's not my recommendation, but he made me think about that.

TJ Blackwell: 01:10:55

They should. They should. They should animate Cool Runnings. They should make an anime remake of Cool Runnings. I would watch that.

Christian Ashley: 01:11:03

Okay. Alex, do you have a recommendation for the audience?

Alex Matthews: 01:11:09

Yeah, same thing. DJ said, try out a sports anime if you haven't. Because I never thought I would like sports anime, but I do like it. You learn a lot.

I learned a lot of basketball terms. Now I feel like a genius when it comes to basketball.

TJ Blackwell: 01:11:29

That's really the best part. Mm, yeah.

Christian Ashley: 01:11:32

Underrated.

TJ Blackwell: 01:11:33

Unexpected ball knowledge.

Alex Matthews: 01:11:35

Yeah. All right.

Christian Ashley: 01:11:36

As I was going through my book, I found the Gone series again. And it's six books for the original series by Michael Grant. Kind of the same guy who was involved with K. Applegate with the Animorph series.

He did his own on his own. Excellent series. There are more books that I have not read I own now, starting with Monster. I'm going to be reading that fairly soon.

So my recommendation is those first six books and I'm hoping the rest are good too. So while paying is unable to come.

TJ Blackwell: 01:12:05

She can hear us. She can still hear.

Christian Ashley: 01:12:07

She can hear. Love you Bank. All right guys, thank you for all you do. Thanks for putting up with this nonsense.

Please if you get a chance, leave a five star review on your podcasting platform of choice. Leave a Like or and subscribe to us down below. If you have an anime that you're super into, just leave a comment down below.

Say hey, why don't you consider this one? We'd love to hear with you guys what your favorites are as well. Leave you a list.

If you want to get in touch with us or maybe even suggest episode topic ideas, you can send an email at systematic ecology gmail.com would like to shout out some supporters. Thank you very much to Ethan Overcash, Austin Nance, Amber Riley and Jonathan Augustine. You guys are the best. But remember, we are the chosen people.

A Geekdom of Briefs.