-A Happy Man, or the Next Victim?-Sports traditions are common. Considering how much I pay attention to sports, this is about all I can say about them. Strange stories do catch my attention however, and there is definitely one surrounding the Hanshin Tigers.
It all started after the 1985 Japan Series. Apparently, there is a tradition, or perhaps an attempted tradition, of Japanese baseball fans jumping into rivers after big victories if they look like a specific player. I assume there is another tradition of everyone getting a tetanus shot after said tradition, but I could be wrong. But Randy Bass was, and probably still is, a foreigner. No one quite matched his smashing appearance besides the one and only Colonel Sanders.
Outside every KFC in Japan, there is a Colonel Sanders statue greeting everyone with a cheeky smile. To rabidly excited baseball fans, he became the embodiment of all foreigners, and joined the fans that had jumped into the river. He, however, drowned.
The statue corpus was discovered on March 10th this year after floating in down the river for 24 years. He was in pretty good shape, only missing one hand and suffering from severe erosion. He is said to have no comment on the incident.
Finding the statue is said to have lifted a bad playing streak off the Hanshin Tigers that has lasted since the 1985 incident. The Hanshin Tigers have not yet had an opportunity to play in the Japan Series yet, considering it is hosted in the fall. Optimism may be the key to success; this will be tested later.
-My Fiancé Doesn't Know I Won't See Him Again-
We can only hope that the curse has been lifted. But so far it doesn't seem that way. Go Tigers!
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