Jerks are gonna jerk.
Ao Ashi S2 Ep. 5
Defense is all about shapes. Unfortunately, people still have the same mentality when talking about love. But before we get to that, let’s get the rest of the match out of the way. Unlike on defense, Aoi knows exactly what to do on offense. As a result, he occupies a gap on the field, which puts him in perfect position to get the ball to Kuribayashi. As a result, the star player sets up another easy goal for Esperion, giving them a clean 3-0 victory. I don’t know soccer very well, so does Aoi still get an assist on that play? Ah well, it doesn’t matter.
What’s interesting is that Aoi isn’t happy even though he got to contribute on the scoring side of the ball, and Fukuda wanted him to have this exact feeling. He wanted the kid to realize that there’s a massive gulf between how he plays offense versus how he plays defense. Aoi needed Akutsu to control him like a pawn to avoid being a complete liability on the other side of the field. This is probably why he immediately begged Fukuda to let him play again. Fukuda automatically rejects the idea. Hell, Aoi probably wouldn’t have made it in today if one of the starters hadn’t gotten injured. So much to Aoi’s disappointment, Fukuda tells him to ride the pine and simply observe for the foreseeable future.
Some annoying stuff still happened after the game was over. Kuribayashi pulls in both Aoi and Akutsu to celebrate the victory, but Akutsu immediately shoves the kid in the chest. This isn’t the first time he’s bullied Aoi, but you could always hedge previously. You could always claim that maybe his teammates didn’t see it happen, which is why no one called Akutsu out for his shitty behavior. But this incident directly happens in front of Kuribayashi, and he doesn’t say a goddamn thing. I don’t get it, man. Aoi did good today. The other guys are even starting to warm up to him. One of them even offers to help with the X’s and O’s. So why is no one calling out Akutsu’s bad behavior?
Speaking of bad behavior, Anri confronts Togashi. Unlike most of the benchwarmers, the latter continues to wear a scowl on his face. He’s not cheering for Aoi like the rest of them. Anri accuses him of underestimating Aoi, which is why he’s being such a baby. You can maybe argue that she shouldn’t have confronted him openly like this — that she’s embarrassing the guy in public. But Togashi spots the girl shaking like a leaf — I mean, he towers over her — so he gets dirty and retorts with casual misogyny. And y’know what? Nobody calls him out for it! Not the rest of the benchwarmers. Isn’t that disappointing? Akutsu gets away with bullying, and Togashi’s friends and teammates just let his shitty remark slide. What is going on!
Anyway, it turns out Hana did show up. In fact, she even cheered when Aoi got onto the field. The only problem is that she sat super far away, and covered her head in a towel. She’s being extremely awkward, because she thinks Aoi would bring up the forehead kiss if he knew she was there. Hmmm… yeah, maybe. He’s a dense enough dunce to do that. Still, none of that cheering is gonna work if he doesn’t hear it. And Aoi even realizes that he hasn’t seen Hana in a while so he misses her. The easy solution, of course, is for him to take the initiative and reach out to her, but will he? Eh.
Even worse, it looks like there’s going to be a love triangle. Hana gets to overhear her brother tell Aoi the bad news. Miyako encourages Hana to cheer Aoi up, but then Anri enters the picture. She gives Aoi a bunch of extensive notes on how he can improve his defensive game, and unfortunately, this is exactly what Hana is insecure about. She doesn’t really understand soccer, so she thinks any words of encouragement she has for him would feel hollow. But that is obviously so not true. Most of us don’t care about that! We just want our loved one’s support! But you can easily imagine Hana continuing to withdraw from Aoi, thinking that Anri is better for him. Again, the easy solution is for Aoi to tell Hana that he still needs her, but he’s so obsessed with soccer, I’m not sure that he will. Not for a long while, anyway.
Still, a lot of sports anime are literally just about the sport. You might say, “Well, duh.” But for me, that makes the story rather one-dimensional. I think it’s a lot more interesting when there’s drama off the field to balance out the drama on the field. Right now, Ace of the Diamond feels dry, because there simply isn’t more to it other than baseball itself. I would prefer no love triangles at all, but if this is the only way we can get these characters to talk about something other than soccer, I guess it’s a small concession to make.
Ace of the Diamond act II -Second Season- Ep. 4
Hmm, would you normally throw a change-up to a lefty if you’re a lefty yourself? I guess you could as long as the change in velocity fools them. But I feel like the more appropriate pitch would be a breaking ball down and away. That still gives you the speed difference without risking a mistake where the change-up catches too much of the plate. The batter fouls the pitch off, so his timing might be off, but it isn’t off by much. Of course, I’m assuming that Mei has the prototypical change-up, which has arm side action.
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…yeah, baseball can get really nerdy like that. Anyway, Furuya is the first to blink, as he allows a leadoff walk to score. Inashiro even does it with a squeeze play too. God, they fucking love to bunt over in Japan. The episode then leaves us with a cliffhanger. Maybe the clean-up hitter gets a home run. Who knows! Just gotta tune in next week!
No more Prince of Tennis. I tried, but it’s just not working out. I literally played tennis in high school, but I can’t make any sense of what is happening on that show other than people randomly playing against each other.