1. Baseball history is full of curses. There’s the Curse of Bambino. The Red Sox sold the legendary Babe Ruth to the Yankees in 1920 and didn’t win another title until 2004.There was the Curse of the Billy Goat. During the 1945 Series, Billy Goat Tavern owner William Sianis and his pet goat were asked to leave Wrigley Field because they were being bothersome to spectators. Sianis said the Cubs would never win again, and they didn’t, until 2016.
2. But maybe the weirdest, most outlandish curse in all of baseball is one you may have never heard of, but wish you had: The Hanshin Tigers’ Colonel Sanders curse. Yes, the team that plays in Nippon Professional Baseball’s Central League was cursed by a fast food chain. “It’s a part of the local culture if you will, the sub-culture of Tigers fans, any Tigers fan that sees the statue knows what it represents.“
3. The curse was finally broken Sunday as the Tigers prevailed over the Orix Buffaloes to win the Japan Series. But to understand what this victory truly means, you have to understand how this all began nearly 40 years ago. Funny enough, the curse got its origins during a jubilant time in Tigers history. The team, mostly an underdog franchise throughout its existence, shocked the Japanese baseball world by winning the Central League pennant in 1985.
Are you interested in baseball, do you support a team? Who is the local team in your area/hometown, what is their mascot? Do they have a strong image (usually people have a loose preconception about a team based on their area or the supporters of that team’s behavior)?
4. Hundreds of fans frolicked through the streets of Osaka, singing and chanting deep into the night. Eventually the crowd gathered around Dōtombori Canal — a sludgy, extremely polluted river in the city. A bit high off the victory, the fans looked at each other, looked at the water, and knew what they had to do next. “The river has that history, There’s some famous author, or Manga writer, or someone like that, who said in the 80’s: ‘If the Tigers win the pennant, I’ll jump in the river.'”
5. So, one by one, fans jumped into the canal. Each pretended they were a member of their first-place team so others could serenade them with the player’s song during their dives. But when they got to Randy Bass — the America-born player who hit 54 homers that season for the Tigers — the revelers realized nobody in their group looked like him. But there was something nearby that did: A giant statue of Colonel Sanders outside the local Kentucky Fried Chicken.
6. They pulled the statue from the store and tossed it in the river, celebrating as it sank deep into the murky waters. The Tigers went on to win the Japan Series a few weeks later. There was no talk of any curse yet, and why would there be? The team had just won the whole thing. But then, after the ’85 championship, things began to go awry.
Can you share any other significant moments in the history of Japanese baseball?
7. The idea of a curse didn’t actually really gain traction until 1988. A popular mystery-solving show called Knight Scoop was commissioned to pull up the fallen Colonel from the Dōtombori Canal. They tried multiple times, but couldn’t get it done. When they had finally given up, the hosts declared something that stuck in the minds of Tigers fans : “Until the Colonel is rescued and cleansed of its sludge, Hanshin has no hopes of winning a championship.”
8. For the next 18 seasons, the Tigers didn’t win a pennant — finishing at the bottom of their league almost every year. Attempts to retrieve the Colonel and reverse the curse failed. The Colonel began appearing in the river or outside the river in Japanese TV shows, video games and other pop culture arenas — haunting Tigers fans anywhere they looked.
9. But then, in 2003, the team finished first again. Once again, there was mayhem in the Osaka streets. More than 5,000 fans jumped into the Dōtombori, thinking their team might win the Series and put the curse to bed.The Tigers didn’t win, losing the title to Fukuoka, 4 games to 3. Finally, in 2009, the Colonel statue was found and pulled up during a routine cleaning of the canal. He looked a little grey and was missing a hand and his glasses, but his smile was still here — albeit a bit creepy.
