Smells Like Team Spirit

Sports anime and teenage regrets

Hey friends!

Sorry for the delay again. It’s the usual: been tired. But I am getting better. Promise.

I apologise for the cheesy title too… I just couldn’t resist.

Smells Like Team Spirit

I’m not really one for harbouring regret. I don’t really see the point. It won’t change the past and it just makes the present miserable. But, right now, watching sports anime is making me regret my youth. Specifically, that I never played for a sporting team at school.

I hated team sports when I was at school—hated it as passionately as others loved it— the very idea of netball brought me out in a cold sweat for at least a decade after I was no longer forced to play it in P.E. lessons. But, I wish I’d been made, by a court order or penalty of death or something, to play for a team. If I could, I’d go back in time and give my lanky teenage self a shake and a stern lecture on how, in a decade or two, she’s going to discover that she’s not allergic to physical exercise, she has an obnoxious competitive streak, actually enjoys working with others and is going to wake up in her thirties, regretting not making the most of her youthful physique and energy.

Knowing teen PJ, who was probably more stubborn than current me, she’d ignore me on purpose and do her own thing anyway—which would be avoiding anything that required extraneous physical effort at all costs. Teenagers can be such a pain.

Maybe I should regret watching sports anime for giving me such regrets about my life. But the truth is, I can’t regret anything as enjoyable and inspiring as sports anime. Also, I just really like watching other people (animated or real) push themselves to their physical limits whilst I lie on the sofa and eat pizza.

I started my foray into the anime sports genre with Kuroko’s Basketball, mainly because it seemed to be pretty popular, Netflix kept recommending it to me, and I’d just watched Physical 100 (if you haven’t watched this masterpiece of South Korean reality T.V. you should check it out right now; I promise it’ll be the best 9 hours or so of your life). With my competitive streak awakened and hungry for more rivalry, personal bests and underdogs achieving the impossible, I thought I’d give an anime on basketball a chance. Kuroko’s Basketball was also one of the anime available with an English dub, and I needed something I could watch without having to keep up with subtitles whilst I ate my pizza. Reading subtitles and putting food in my mouth at the same time is beyond my multitasking skills.

Anyway. Big mistake. Because, even though I knew nothing about basketball, have never been remotely interested in it, and probably have some sort of residual athlemaphobia from my childhood, I suddenly found myself fully invested in Japanese high school basketball. Invested enough to binge all three seasons in about a week. This isn’t just testament to how I probably need to do something about my obsessive tendencies, but to how good Kuroko’s Basketball is as an anime. Everything about it works: the animation of the games, the characters, the script and the soundtrack—it all comes together in a compelling story of passion, hard work and team spirit. I laughed. I cried. I squealed loud enough to probably disturb my neighbours, and I learnt a lot about basketball and the joy of belonging to a team.

The latter is the most important element. The entire premise of Kuroko’s Basketball, is that the protagonist, Kuroko, wants to prove to his ex-teammates, the Generation of Miracles (five extremely talented but selfish players), that his style of basketball, which prioritises team spirit and winning together, is better than their victory-at-the-cost-of-the-team approach… and also more fun. Kuroko is constantly asking the other players if they enjoy playing basketball and reminding them that you can’t play basketball on your own nor can you win on your own: it’s all about the team.

The void left by my basketball binge naturally led me to watching Haikyuu!! next, which is about Japanese high school volleyball. This has a different overall style to it but it’s just as compelling and made me laugh out loud almost every episode. In fact, these two anime are now life-long favourites and there had better be a new season of Haikyuu!! in the works or my life is forever going to have a volleyball-sized hole in it. Haikyuu!! has a similar message to Kuroko’s Basketball: the team, not the individual, is everything.

This message only really works because both protagonists, Kuroko and Hinata, are not naturally gifted in their chosen sport. Both of them are technically too short for a sport where height is supposedly everything. And both of them start out below average in the fundamental skills required to play on a team. They have nothing to offer except their passion for the sport, determination to learn and devotion to their teammates.

And that is what counts. Both Kuroko and Hinata know they are nothing without their team. Kuroko was abandoned by his previous middle school teammates, the Generation of Miracles; and Hinata was literally the only member of the volleyball club in his middle school, so both of them understand the value of a real team when they get to high school. Even though Kuroko can’t be a shining light like Seirin’s ace, Kagami, he can be his shadow and help make Kagami and the whole team number one in Japan; and Hinata isn’t a volleyball genius like Karasuno’s setter, Kageyama, but he is the only one who can hit Kageyama’s quick toss because of his complete faith in their partnership (even thought they fight like cats and dogs every other minute of the day). What Kuroko and Hinata both have, and what they instil in others, is team spirit.

And I think that’s what I regret most about not being part of a sports team when I was at school. I was probably the antithesis of Team Spirit and peak Lone Wolf. Group work in class filled me with dread and team games at youth group terrified me. Working independently was easy and safe; the horror of team work was other people. On top of that, I grew up surrounded by a philosophy of ‘If you can’t do it well right away, don’t do it at all’. So, what I probably needed was to get over those fears and misconceptions by being part of a proper team. And I reckon a sports team might have provided that. It might have helped my confidence, communication skills and killed the I’m-better-off-on-my-own complex I took with me well into adulthood. It might have ignited in me a small flame of that team spirit I admire so much in others.

So what even is Team Spirit?

The Collins Dictionary defines it as: ‘the feeling of pride and loyalty that exists among the members of a team and that makes them want their team to do well or to be the best’.

I’m going to offer my own take on that and suggest that team spirit is what you experience when you become part of something bigger than yourself.

Of course, you don’t have to be part of a sports team to experience that. In fact, the first time I had the revelation that the thing missing from my life was being part of something bigger than me and my personal ambitions was when I watched the Christmas Puppet Musical my church holds every year for the local community on Christmas Eve. I’d never been into puppets but I’ve always loved theatre and it was so inspiring to see what could be achieved by a small group of adults and young people as an outreach to the local community. Seeing the joy it brought to the audience and the excited reactions of both kids and adults was genuinely moving. At the end of the performance, I turned to my mum and declared: ‘I want to be part of that. I want to be part of something bigger than myself.’

So now I am. And it’s one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. Took me long enough, eh?

The truth is, no one is really designed to be a lonely bookworm-hermit. Or an island—as John Donne more poetically put it. We’re meant to be connected into a greater whole—part of something bigger than our individual selves. And when you’re part of a team, there’s really no room for ego or selfish ambition. Sure, in sports you get your aces, stars who shine brighter than everyone else, but those individuals still need their teammates to play the game and bring home victory… as a team; for the team. A performance needs its leading actors and its extras. Even the lonely writer needs an editor. Trust me: a book is much better when an editor is involved.

It’s also just fun to play and be creative with others.

 So, in summary, and no particular order, here’s 8 things sports anime has taught me about the value of being part of a team:

1. Everyone has something to offer: even if you’re only 5ft 4” and suck at the fundamental skills of volleyball, you can still be the best decoy ever.

2. Failing is part of growing—in fact, sometimes it’s the only way to figure out that you can turn your Misdirection into a Vanishing Drive, and your old Weirdo Quick into a better New Quick.

3. You can try winning on your own, but it’s more satisfying to win together—looking at you rainbow-haired Generation of Miracles.

4. Facing a stronger opponent or an impossible challenge is a reason to be excited not afraid—seriously, it’s like an aphrodisiac or something to these characters.

5. Anyone, even when they’re essentially a blue-haired ghost with zero dribbling or shooting skills, can be a winner when they’re part of a team.

6. Teammates, even those who are rivals, make you stronger not weaker—honestly, Hinata and Kageyama’s superhuman level of competitive bickering makes me wish I had someone to push against like that.

7. Whatever happens and wherever you’re at in your own personal journey, you’re never on your own: there’s always someone to fix a sloppy receive, spike your toss or turn a rebound into a winning dunk.

8. Everyone’s effort is connected. Every receive, every pass, every jump contributes to the whole team’s play: a receive is useless if it doesn’t get the ball to the setter, and a setter’s toss is pointless if the spikers aren’t in position, ready to hit it over the net. It’s like a beautiful spiderweb of teamwork.

Obviously, this is anime we’re talking about and not reality. The reality of team sport probably isn’t that rosy, but I’m going to wilfully ignore that; I’m feeling inspired. It’s a good thing the fatigue is preventing me from impulsively buying a volleyball right now and heading down the beach… maybe in the summer? And I suppose there’s always the staff netball team, if I can get over my childhood trauma.

In the meantime, has anyone got any recommendations for more sports anime?

I’ve got a sofa and a pizza waiting…

Let me know your thoughts, recommendations, and team sport experiences by clicking the comment button below. And if you enjoyed this post, please feel free to like, share and subscribe.

Let’s keep figuring stuff out together, as a L@23.5° team!

PJ