Robert Whiting grew up in a small town in California and came to Tokyo in the early 1960s as a GI. After his military service ended, he stayed on, working as an English tutor, encyclopedia editor, and eventually a freelance writer.
Tokyo Junkie is part memoir and part ode to the city he calls home. While Whiting ranges widely in his subject matter, several recurring themes emerge throughout the book: baseball, politics, the press, and the criminal underworld. As a gaijin (foreigner), Whiting often approaches these subjects through comparison, contrasting Japanese customs and institutions with their American equivalents.
Baseball is perhaps the clearest example because it is such a consciously American import. Its popularity in Japan grew alongside fascination with American culture, and part of its original appeal was precisely that it felt foreign and exotic. Yet today baseball is arguably more culturally significant in Japan than in the United States. In America, Major League Baseball is probably only the fourth most-watched sports league, behind the NFL, college football, and the NBA. In Japan, by contrast, baseball is unquestionably the dominant sport, with intensely devoted fans who memorize statistics with almost Rain Man-like precision.
Unlike Whiting, I am not a believer in the church of baseball. I find the game incredibly dull and struggle to pay attention long enough to follow what is happening. But just as the Bible itself often plays only a minor role in the religious devotion of many Christians, the actual games can be only a small part of baseball fandom.
Equally important are:
* The stories surrounding the players: their obsessive dedication to practice, their personal lives and beliefs, and the recurring appearance of “bad boys” who violate fan expectations and become the focus of endless criticism and debate. * The statistics: as in the United States, Japanese baseball culture is deeply statistical, generating a constant stream of analysis and argument. * The politics: fans scrutinize managers, front offices, player acquisitions, and coaching strategies with remarkable intensity. In both Japan and the U.S., fans tend to view team executives not as ordinary businesspeople, but as representatives who ought to answer to the public.
One especially rich source of controversy in Japanese baseball during the 1970s and 1980s was the gaijin players themselves. Many were aging MLB veterans lured overseas late in their careers. They were often criticized both for their high salaries and for failing to conform to Japanese social norms.
The first such player Whiting interviewed was Clyde Wright, a “Tennessee farm boy” whom the Japanese press dubbed “Crazy Wright.” Wright was prone to explosive temper tantrums, a trait poorly received in Japan. He got into repeated fights and once reportedly urinated in the hat of a reporter who had written a negative story about him.
For his part, Wright found Japan baffling. He recalled a coach pulling him aside after a string of strong performances to warn him that he was “winning too much” and making the other starting pitchers jealous. After a series of bad outings, a team executive suggested that Wright send his wife back to Los Angeles because “sex was obviously interfering with his pitching.” During Whiting’s interview with him, a fan approached the table asking not only for an autograph but also for permission to touch Wright’s hairy forearms. Wright agreed, though he sighed afterward, “I git this all the time.”
Less outrageous than Wright, but no less objects of fascination, were the Black American players who came to Japan. Reggie Smith, after sixteen MLB seasons, signed with the Yomiuri Giants for one final year. Smith remarked that he had heard the word “nigger” more often in Japan than during his entire MLB career. Like Wright, he also complained about fans’ obsession with his body hair, with some even reaching under his jersey to feel his chest hair. Smith returned to the United States after a single season.
Despite such experiences, some Black players found genuine acceptance in Japan. Warren Cromartie played seven seasons with the Giants and became a major celebrity, earning the nickname “the Black Samurai.” He won league MVP honors in 1989 and remains one of the most beloved foreign players in Japanese baseball history.
Whiting’s life in Tokyo is bookended by the city’s two Olympic Games, in 1964 and 2020. He uses the Olympics as a lens through which to reflect on more than half a century of transformation. The city itself was almost entirely rebuilt during that period; Whiting notes that there are now few buildings in Tokyo older than he is. At the same time, Tokyo evolved from an impoverished, mob-dominated city still struggling to recover from the devastation of World War II into what is arguably the world’s most functional megacity. It's an interesting story and he tells it well.