ABSTRACT
This chapter notes that baseball was just one of many tools the Japanese adopted as they embarked on their campaign of modernization. The adaptations they made to the game gave it its distinctive character. This included privileging the parent company/franchise relationship, and the “content provision” and brand image functions of the team. The “modern era” for Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) began in 1950 as the nation – recovering from its disastrous experience of modernity through empire – sought to become a leading nation once again through the pursuit of economic/scientific power. NPB mirrored the strengths and weaknesses of postwar Japan's political economy, including the toleration of systemic inefficiencies that made teams chronically unprofitable. Neither model could be sustained as Japan's domestic and international circumstances changed at the start of the Heisei period.
