It’s hard to imagine a team named the Japan Robins providing much of an offensive threat, especially when you’re raised in a society where sports franchises are named after some of the most deadly and savage lifeforms on the planet – - Lion, Tigers, Bears, Blue Jays. No one would suspect that a squad sharing the same moniker as Batman’s underage ward would produce a dynamic duo (liked how I tied that in, huh?) that would prove be the bane (again!) of every hurler to take the mound in the NES version of Baseball Stars, but Oh and Kagenu’s wood are two of the biggest, powerful, most painful to endure.
I’ve harbored a far-from-secret hatred of the pair since the summer of ‘89 when I discovered the 8-bit sporting perfection that is Baseball Stars. Yes, I realize that holding a personal grudge against a pair of fictional, videogame characters is the epitome of absurdity. Unfortunately, if you’ve read this blog thus far, you’ve come to realize that I am inherently absurd, so the venom that bubbles within is quite justified.
I used to have best-of-seven series with my best friend Bobby Matthews that, after nearly 20 years of playing Baseball Stars, I’ve yet to win. This is by no means an indication of my ineptitude; on the contrary, I was quite adept at dismantling anyone with enough manhood to grasp a NES controller in hand while the cartridge was in the system. My homies Willie Carter, Vital Rodeiguez, and Keith Savoia all felt the sting of my Ninja Blacksox – - so why the troubles against Mr. Matthews? He always selected the Japan Robins, and the team’s twin towers of terror, Oh and Kagenu, always (and I mean always) found a way to sully my victory.
Japan is a pretty decent squad with strong pitching, above average base running, and solid defense. Oh and Kagenu anchor The Robins’ offense by batting back to back in the lineup. Although they aren’t impossible to pitch to (Oh’s Hitting and Batting ability are both ranked a powerful 12 out of 15, while Kagenu scores a 10 and 12, respectively) you have to be very, very careful. They don’t hit homers at an ungodly clip like the members of Baseball Stars’ All-‘Roid Squad, the American Dreams, but they have an uncanny ability to pop ‘em when they count, which I attribute to their high Luck ratings (both are ranked at 12).
Even when they aren’t depositing baseballs in bleachers, Oh and Kagenu still manage to drive in runs no matter how horrid a day they’d been having before the potential R.B.I. situation. Those mofos could be a combined 0-for-their-last-9, but as soon as one of their crew touches second base, they stop playing around and proceed to make you cry schoolgirl tears. It wouldn’t be so horrible to face just one batter annoying as this, but when you place two back to back in the lineup, that’s where things enter “I want to break the controller” territory.
I can recall one particular incident where Bobby’s Robins and my rather excellent Ninja Blacksox were once again locking horns in an intense seven-game series. For the first time ever in the history of our “Bragging Rights World Series” I’d jumped ahead to a 2-0 lead which made me giddy as a little girl, and made Bobby wonder what the was going wrong in the depths of the universe that threw his reality into such a state of imbalance. Game Three began and I was up 3-0 in one of the later innings, perhaps the 7th or 8th. Oh was hitless that day and strode to the plate with two men on. I entered smack-talk mode to mask a twinge of fear. I swallowed nervously. I delivered the pitch. I blew my lead. Oh ripped a bullet of triple to bring everyone home, which is the very definition of the aforementioned luck as he’s the very definition of lead-footed.
Cut to extra innings. As my tears had just begun to dry, Kagenu strode to the plate versus Sanda, my ace reliever and the MVP of my Blacksox staff. I delivered a sinker that Kagenu kindly deposited into right field nosebleed section to both secure his win and once again break my spirit. Now imagine scenarios like that happening for two decades straight and you’ll understand my bitterness, frustration, and possible psychosis toward these 8-bit ballplayers.
