TOKYO: Japanese baseball star Shohei Ohtani matched a Babe Ruth record this summer in the United States and scooped an award for a top male athlete, but back home, everyone has been glued to the high-school tournament where he started out.
August in Japan means blazing heat, syrupy shaved ice and one thing on TV: Koshien, the contest that launched the career of greats like Ohtani, the 2021 American League’s Most Valuable Player.
The annual two-week tournament, which held its championship game Monday in which Sendai Ikuei triumphed 8-1 over Shimonoseki Kokusai, was cancelled in 2020 and took place with nearly empty…