Muratafan comments

Instead of $500 million, he'll get $300 million. There are far worse things in life.

To me, the biggest drawback of all this is that now many potential Ohtani's will be told 'hey kid, don't try it. Ohtani did it, but blew out his pitching arm in doing so. You can try it, but you're risking too much - not worth it.'

Just for the sake of the above, I hope Ohtani can make a pitching comeback in the 2025 season.

He's done a lot for the game of baseball and having a true unicorn was really fun.

Just don't sign with the Mets. They are snakebit and virtually always dysfunctional and their history with Japanese players has not been good. I see 3/4 teams in the running: Dodgers, Yankees, Mets and maybe the Red Sox.

What a laughable article. So, Hong Kong buys literally tons of farm-raised shrimp from China and Southeast Asia - which is loaded with chemicals, pesticides, etc.. The list includes land-locked prefectures in Japan. And, the amount of radioactive waste being dumped is a literal fraction of what is considered dangerous. So, someone from Hong Kong is eating pesticide-laden, farm-raised shrimp and is oblivious to it, but is boycotting Japanese seafood. Makes no sense.

So today even if China is sanctioned, China with Russian and Iran can absorb sanctions and destroy the West entirely. Look at Europe now.

I am certain Europe would be crushed to a pulp economically and UK would be ruined. US may survive (the wealthy) but in a badly weakened state. The middle class and JD Vance blue collar families will be devastated. China and Russia and Iran will emerge stronger than ever.

They have a working economy of 800 million middle class. It can take a big hit. The U.S. portion of their GDP is only 3%. Sanctions would be incredibly suicidal.

China is an incredible country. China says it is ready broker peace talks between Israel and Palestine. They might be able to score another peace deal; this time Israel and Palestine.

Here's your 50 cents, Wumao. Comrade Xi would be so proud of you.

All hail the new leader of the entire world, the Middle Kingdom!

Great news for Sapporo, Hoikkado and Japan. Any Olympics is simply not worth it. Pre-internet days, maybe. Post-internet days, no. If I want to watch international competitions anywhere in the world, I can get the highlights for free and don't have to sit through nationalistic biases all day or some fluff.

Rather than focusing solely on numbers, the revision will also incorporate strategies to address "tourism pollution" through measures such as attracting high-end tourists and encouraging them to venture outside the main cities.

Translation: Chinese tourists are loud and cause noise pollution and regular pollution and are not 'high-end'.

Most beneficial scandal in quite some time. The IOC grifters have outlived their usefulness. With the internet, international travel, etc. the Olympics has lost quite a bit of their luster, especially the Winter games that are dominated by the Nordic European countries. The 'bids' are pretty half-hearted from the two 'finalists' of Salt Lake City and Sapporo. With less bids, less payola for the IOC.

Lots of trolls out today. My gosh, why shouldn't you be excited for Japan? I see the usual suspects who felt the urge to denigrate Roki Sasaki after his perfect game are the same ones here downvoting enthusiastic fans of Samurai Blue after a thrilling win.

It's actually worse in the U.S. than before. After Florida passed the 'Castle Doctrine' any gun-toting yokel has the authority to 'shoot first, ask later' if he believes he is threatened on 'his property'. And, yes, the Castle Doctrine and 'Stand Your Ground' (every post-50, out-of-shape white conservative's dream of a Clint Eastwood Dirty Harry re-enactment) is applicable in Louisiana. With Stand Your Ground and the Castle Doctrine, the Louisiana Shooter wouldn't even go to trial, let alone get arrested.

And...Mexican immigrants actually have a minimal, if not slightly beneficial, impact on crime.

Do Mexican Immigrants "Cause" Crime? | Department of Criminology (upenn.edu)

So...I am sure Bass will try to scour the internet for another 'source'. Here's the problem Bass, I will humble brag right now and say that I have a Phd in social sciences and the above paper/research was published after peer review to ensure that there wasn't omitted correlated variable bias, sample selection bias, endogeneity, self-selection issues, etc.

I own guns for hunting. I am totally in favor of gun control.

The Cold War lasted for 44 years (1947-1991). America has plenty of experience in a multi-polar world and I think Blair doesn't quite understand the degree to which the Cold War impacted American politics. I grew up during the later part of the Cold War (literally born at the halfway point of it). Russia was part of quite a few everyday conversations.

Russia seems to want to return to the Cold War era, but this time it will be teamed up with China.

Communism vs. Capitalism part II. Nothing more, nothing less.

The only difference between this Cold War and the prior Cold War is that America has a ton of investment in China. Russia's manufacturing base, etc.. is still awful and their only export of note is oil.

What's amazing to me is that Russia's economy is still very, very undiversified and very reliant on fossil fuel and that in the 30 years post 1991, there has been very little to improve Russia's economy for those other than the Russian Oligarchs.

I can only imagine how good Ohtani's numbers would be with a better bullpen behind him (Iglesias is really struggling this season) and some more protection behind him (Trout is once again on the mend and he's the only real threat besides Ohtani). If Ohtani replicates this type of season next year, he's looking at at $50million a year contract. Don't believe me? The Mets shelled out $130 million for 3 seasons of Max Scherzer. Ohtani will be valued higher provided he doesn't get injured.

Surprised Jake Paul hasn't signed a contract with Mayweather. I'm sure it would be a huge Youtube type of spectacle....for idiots who still like Jake Paul and Mayweather. There's a market for everything, I guess.

Japan's aging population, combined with its pension system, requires some sort of influx of tax revenues for the government to sustain its pension system. Those tourism dollars and associated sales taxes and hotel taxes were probably doing a solid job of ensuring the pension system doesn't go totally bankrupt.

If you're Western tourist who wants a bit of culture shock, but not worry about someone stealing your wallet or getting some sort of gastrointestinal issue, then Japan's a solid place to go.

It's safe, clean, trains are incredible. The issue is overcrowding and lack of English.

I went to Japan the first time in 1997. The lack of credit card acceptance and poor ATMs was demoralizing. Japan made a lot of necessary progress from 1997 - 2015 or so.

Gotta love China. They manage to tick off 3 countries simultaneously. Han supremacy at its very finest.

So China hasn't invaded anyone in a long time. Well, it's because they weren't able to.

Don't conflate unwillingness to invade with the inability to invade.

Now that China has the second largest military on Earth AND has increased in 15% in two years AND throw in the fact that China didn't 'invade' Tibet, Mongolia, Hong Kong and didn't have regional skirmishes with India. Combined that with a pretty aggressive stance towards the Indo-Pacific and you have a global need to make sure that China doesn't try to unilaterally 'enforce' its 'vision of a greater China' (see the South China Sea). Just ask the Philippines.

Oh and let's not forget that China DID try to invade Japan at least twice and they lost both times. In terms of 'containment', let's also talk about China's overfishing of pretty much everyway they claim as 'theirs'.

There's some performative drama here all for the sake of the CCP. CCP conveniently allows the Western media images about how stringent they are in addressing COVID so that the CCP can say 'we've always been hyper-vigilant about this, it's because you Westerners caused COVID in the first place is the reason why it became a pandemic'.

Kind of like how the CCP trumpeted how awesome they built those hospitals in a few weeks due to the great engineering of the CCP and the great work ethic of the CCP-inspired people. It backfired since the immediate question became 'if you have COVID under control, why do you need to build the hospital so fast?'.

China and the islands make a pact and all of a sudden the colonial powers get their knickers in a twist. Meanwhile China has to put up with American military in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, SE Asia and Pakistan? 

So...China does NOT have a colonial past or present? So, what do you call Mongolia, Tibet and Hong Kong? Just part of the 'larger Sinosphere'? And all 3 just magically wanted to 'join' in the CCP fun?

The selective, self-serving moral outrage (almost always coming from a Western European or someone from the non-US Anglosphere) and the blame America first attitude makes me nauseous.

The U.S. is the world's police and everyone loves to hate the police until they need the police.

My gosh, the J-haters are out in full force today. Sasaki is 20 years-old and possesses a 100 mph fastball, which is quite rare even in the States. Just enjoy the moment people, sheesh.

For a good, extra sharp cheddar cheese, it takes one year of aging - which is perfect for using excess milk and it gives plenty of time for the marketing arms of cheese producers to get the word out. Getting cheddar cheese in Japan is difficult enough, sharp and extra sharp cheddar is like finding hen's teeth.

Otherwise, Japan's cheese 'selection' consists of rubbery slices of Velveeta like quality, 'pizza' cheese with some concoction of something like mozzarella that is shredded and overpackaged wasabi cheese. Wasabi cheese is good, the rest of the cheese in Japan is severely lacking.

I have a sneaky suspicion that what will be reported by the Chinese authorities will be something along the lines of 'the sole cause of this tragedy was poorly made American aircraft.'

I streamed the whole game. Truthfully, the score is not that indicative of how dominant Japan was. If not for a couple of Minamino shots that hit the woodwork, the score could've been much worse.

In the last 10 matches with Australia, Japan has 6 wins, 3 draws and 1 loss.

That's a very dominant run

Hopefully, Japan can advance past the round of 16 this time

Sake sales are gaining steam in the U.S. and the Americans who drink sake actually appreciate the process and are - for Americans - a pretty particular group of people. If these sake producers (and their marketing teams) do it right, there's plenty of demand in America for premium sake...so hopefully this 'growth mindset' holds and sake culture spreads. These smaller sake producers truly need to band together a bit to help promote their brands overseas like a manufacturer's co-op.

'Kobe beef' on the other hand, in America....is a lost cause.

The headline alone is progress. At least Yoon publicly admitted he wanted better ties and said 'future oriented'. This is light years better than his predecessor, who had no reservations when stating virtually everything in terms of conditional terms like 'when Japan fully realizes its past mistakes will the relationship prosper' or something along those lines.

However, this was not the defining issue of Yoon's platform, so he might just reverse course when things get tough since Japan-bashing almost always guarantees a bump in approval polling.

Interestingly, China seems to be helping unite Japan and Korea. Funny how that works.

A country doesn't increase military spending by close to 15% over two years without intentions of using it. Is China really afraid of being invaded? Doubtful.

Is China ramping up for future skirmishes OUTSIDE of China? Likely.

I thought China invented soccer, no? I mean they did invent skiing.

Irreparable harm....to the IOC members' bank accounts is more like it.

Ah yes....Eileen Gu. As a American, it's very tiresome to hear some (not all) Asian-Americans vent about being 'perpetual foreigners' in America - yet at the same moment celebrate how Eileen Gu is 'representing them'.

We have a saying in America 'you made your bed, now sleep in it.'

Or, 'you reap what you sow.' Yep, Eileen can have the Chinese money, but she will not see many American endorsement dollars.

So, no sour grapes from me. But, Eileen, if you want you can have the Chinese endorsement money, but don't expect Americans endorsement money.

Addfwyn,

Clearly, clearly, you are not someone who has played ice hockey. China doesn't even have a youth sports league in hockey...yet 'look at what they've done in pair skating'. They are two totally different sports. One is a team sport that requires a full 25 man roster, the other is a sport that requires two people who can train 7 days a week and not have to worry too much about injuries (meaning that depth is not usually a concern). China typically does horribly at men's team sports (see: basketball, soccer or 'football') in an international setting. China has been doing the basketball thing for quite some time (see: Yao Ming and the Chinese Basketball Association has been around for 27 years) and they cannot even beat Greece (or Canada) in Olympic qualifiers.

Your admiration for all things Chinese is quite honorable....and consistent.

Let's see here: China originates Covid, pressures the WHO into false disclosures, allows its (potentially infected) citizens to travel outside of the country (while barring domestic travel), provides a crappy vaccine solely for the photo opportunities, and then takes a swipe at the U.S. and 'the West'.

Oh and by the way, protectionism? My goodness, China's protectionism is off the charts.

So many contradictions from the CCP. Remember when the CCP gloriously gloated over the building of that hospital in such a short time? Well, the CCP forgot to realize that a non-Chinese audience would ask a follow up question: if COVID is so well contained in China, then WHY did China need to build an entire new hospital in such a short time? Obviously, the CCP never had to answer that obvious question.

Fast forward to today: if 83% of their population is vaccinated against COVID with the amazing SINOVAC and that the CCP clearly has COVID under control, why the need for such draconian measures now?

Say what you will about America, but at least there's a saying 'where there is smoke, there is fire'. Apparently, the CCP just believes the mantra 'if we say it, YOU must believe it.' That doesn't work so well in free and democratic countries.