[Feature: Youth and Sports] Roundtable Discussion: Play Well, Learn Well, and Grow Strong

Today, I would like to discuss "Youth and Sports" with all of you.

Since you are all individuals who are currently or have been very active in Keio sports and physical education, I would like to start by having you talk about any issues you feel are currently problematic in your respective daily fields. Mr. Ueda, could you please start?

I stepped down as the manager of the Keio University High School Baseball Club five years ago. Based on what I felt during my tenure, the players who entered Keio High School, including those from internal advancement, had an incredibly high number of injuries. Particularly in the elbows, lower back, and knees. If anything, there were many recurrences of injuries sustained during junior high school, and many players underwent surgery while in high school.

Taisei Tsuruzaki, who was selected by Rakuten from the university baseball club in the recent draft, was doing well until his second year of high school, but in his third year, his elbow hurt so much he couldn't throw, and he eventually had Tommy John surgery (ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction). Fortunately, he blossomed in university and made it to the pros, but there are players like that.

When I ask such players, they say things like, "In junior high, I pitched all five games in one week by myself during summer vacation." It hurt even then, but they pushed themselves to keep pitching, and the injury recurred in high school.

Furthermore, I am currently a coach for the university baseball club, and when I take injured players to the doctor and listen to them, they say, "I've been pitching three games every weekend since elementary school." Because they're the ace, you see. Children who have overused their elbows like that often get injured in high school and again in university, eventually requiring surgery.

This is a problem that needs to be considered by the entire baseball world, but because each sports organization is devising measures on its own, there is also the problem that no progress is being made beyond that.

This is an old yet new problem. I'm sure the instructors don't make them do it because they want to break the players. The children say they "want to pitch," and the parents also have a strong desire to "make their child win," so I think it is very difficult for instructors to suppress those wishes of the individuals and their families and make them rest.

However, on the other hand, hearing what you just said, it is clearly overkill. If an elbow is broken during the growth period, it will leave irreversible aftereffects. How is it in tennis?

What became a topic in the high school tennis world last year was that the rules for the Inter-High (All Japan High School Athletic Federation) were changed midway. In the case of tennis, the team competition is held first, and the individual competition starts the next day. Therefore, players who participate in the team competition and then the individual singles and doubles must fight while exhausted.

In such a schedule, because it was extremely hot last year, several people collapsed from heatstroke during the team competition and were taken away by ambulance. In the process of devising countermeasures, the conclusion reached by the tournament organizers was to change the finals and semifinals, which had been played as three-set matches for many years, to one-set eight-game pro sets.

In the individual competition of the Inter-High, they play as many as four matches a day. I experienced that myself in high school and was taken away by ambulance with full-body convulsions. Everyone knew this was absolutely impossible, yet it continued, but last year there was finally a slight change.

It hasn't become a fundamental improvement yet, but the fact that it has changed slightly in favor of the players makes me hope it will continue to change from next year onwards.

How much of a difference is there in the time a match takes between a three-set match and an eight-game match?

If a three-set match goes to a full set, it can sometimes take nearly four hours in long cases. But with an eight-game match, it's about an hour and a half to two hours at the longest.

Besides heatstroke, are there cases where people break their elbows or shoulders due to over-practicing?

Yes. As expected, elbows and wrists are common. Also the lower back and lower body.

Ms. Sasaki, what are your thoughts?

The year before last, "overdoing it" in club activities became an issue at the Japan Sports Agency. I was slightly involved in the discussion to propose "how long practice should appropriately be."

Among children, there are, of course, those who do not do sports. However, for those who do, it is often a case of "overdoing it," and it is becoming polarized. Therefore, unless guidelines are created, such as having at least two rest days a week and keeping one practice session within two hours, they will practice limitlessly in order to win. So, we proposed something that would serve as some kind of guideline. The length of practice time for club activities is certainly becoming a problem.

However, there are parts that cannot be easily decided by numbers. I also looked into the situation overseas, but the systems are different to begin with, so they weren't very helpful.

At the Graduate School of Health Management, a master's student once conducted a complete census of club activities at junior high schools in Nakano Ward. As for the problems, first, the number of instructors is very limited, and those instructors are so busy they don't even have time to be involved in club activities. And matches are often on Saturdays and Sundays, and they have to be involved in all of them.

It's already a "black" environment (laughs). Most of the instructors are not specialists in that sport, and it seems they are often in a state of true exhaustion. However, if you ask for outside help, there is also the question of their qualifications, which makes it difficult.

Organizations like the Japan Sport Association also say that it is important for instructors not only to teach the skills of the sport but also to build a foundation as an instructor, in a human sense. So, they are changing the instructor training system and incorporating things like active learning, but I think it is still difficult for this to permeate down to schools nationwide.

Mr. Ueda and Ms. Matsunaga, as you are both instructing in the field, I'm sure you experience this often, but the influence of an instructor is very large, not only on children but even if the other person is an adult, in both good and bad ways.

Therefore, the qualifications of an instructor are never just about having experience in that sport; they must also have the perspective of an educator. So, I also think it's not that simple. On the other hand, as people often say, "I'd like to experience being a high school baseball manager once," it is also undoubtedly a very attractive field.

In that way, the training of instructors is an extremely serious issue, but in the case of Keio University, I think we are blessed because there are many highly qualified people like Mr. Ueda and Ms. Matsunaga.

In the case of Keio, I truly feel that the fact that graduates follow up is also very significant.

The topic of children who don't do sports also came up, but for example, do you feel that the physical strength of Yochisha Elementary School students is declining?

I only have about 10 years of experience, but intuitively I don't feel it has dropped that much.

Children coming from the lower levels of Keio are surprisingly good, aren't they? Keio, including Yochisha, has a tremendous understanding of exercise. For example, at the Keio Futsubu School and Chutobu Junior High School, students can moderately belong to multiple clubs several times a week. They have created a good system, and since the goal is for the child to move up to high school and continue sports until university, I think this is a good trend.

At Keio, the words from "One Hundred Discourses of Fukuzawa," "First, build a robust body, then cultivate the mind," are often quoted. It's also significant that there is the teaching of Yukichi Fukuzawa that a weak prodigy is no good, and that health and physical strength after becoming an adult are important.

I feel that even when looking at university students. My classes have many women, and in physical education class, the children I think "can do anything" are usually from Yochisha. Even if they haven't specialized in a particular sport, many children have no resistance to moving their bodies and can do things skillfully. I think that kind of form is ideal.

In general, even children who do sports often only do one sport, but I think it is a very good thing to be doing various sports.

It is often said that today's children just play games instead of moving their bodies and playing when they have time. However, Yochisha seems to be different.

Right now, jump rope has started in the third term. This is something that both children who like it and those who hate it absolutely must do. For fourth graders, there are 13 events in total, such as forward jumps, double unders, and backward double unders, and many classes set a goal to clear them all, so almost all students are doing it in the morning.

That is one of the events I thought was really great when I came to Yochisha. Since they use real rope instead of plastic, they can't do it unless they sharpen their senses and use trial and error. When I see the Yochisha students doing that, I think, "Ah, this is fun."

There are two good points to jump rope. One is that, for example, children who are fast runners are fast from the first to the sixth grade, and it's rare for a child who was last in the first grade to become a relay runner in the sixth grade through effort. However, with jump rope, the more you practice, the better you get.

This is educationally very excellent. Therefore, even for a child who is a slow runner, if they practice jump rope and clear it, it becomes a great source of self-confidence.

Particularly short children are often good at jump rope.

The other point is what is recently called "high-impact sports"; exercises that apply impact to the lower limbs and leg bones are very important for making bones strong.

For example, in the case of girls, the event of menarche occurs, but to put it very roughly, before menarche, growth hormones are more dominant than sex hormones in girls. If they do high-impact sports during that period, bone is formed on the outer circumference of the bone, making the bone thicker. However, there is research that after menarche, when sex hormones become dominant, bone is formed predominantly on the inside of the bone, so the bone does not get very thick.

In other words, although it hasn't been proven yet, it is said that doing high-impact sports around the lower grades of elementary school promotes bone growth and should have a good effect when that person becomes elderly. In an era where extending healthy life expectancy is emphasized, instead of curing osteoporosis after it occurs, we should strive for primary prevention to prevent it. For that purpose, it is considered important not to create children who dislike exercise when they are young.

Swimming also has many wonderful points as a sport, but even if you swim all year round, gravity is canceled out in the water, so while the body gets stronger, the bones do not. Jump rope is ideal for making bones strong. It is an ideal exercise in those two respects.

It's not that we are forcing it on them; the children start jumping from the morning while having fun, and they really love it. Even children who have cleared the 13 events challenge the Yochisha records set by their seniors.

There are records like 118 minutes of forward jumping. At Yochisha, there is an official rule that if you are in the middle of a jump rope record, you don't have to attend class, so even children who dislike studying work hard at it (laughs). The fact that past physical education teachers kept solid records is also significant.

That's an important thing. To prevent children from disliking exercise, we have school teachers work hard to introduce things like jump rope and let even children who are not very good at exercise experience achieving a goal. If they have such successful experiences, children will not grow to dislike exercise and it will lead to maintaining a healthy body even after they become elderly.

From the perspective of your specialty, developmental ethology, Ms. Sasaki, are cases often seen recently where children fall in ways that didn't happen in the past?

Originally, children really do all kinds of movements. Adults walk, sit, and at most run, but children do dozens of types of movements. However, it seems that opportunities to experience diverse actions are steadily decreasing.

For example, when they were young, they would learn with their bodies, not their heads, how to use their bodies to avoid falling when they lost their balance. However, if the entire environment is flat without any bumps, such movements become unnecessary. Therefore, the number of children who have never done movements that would have been done inevitably in the past is increasing. It is said that when they experience complex movements for the first time after getting a bit older, they cannot control their bodies well, which may lead to injuries.

It also seems that bones are actually weakening. I heard a story just recently that in an elementary school physical education class, there was a case where a student fractured their wrist as soon as they put their hands on a vaulting box.

That is probably a condition called a greenstick fracture, which is unique to children. Instead of snapping like a dry tree branch, it's called a greenstick fracture because it's like trying to break a supple, living tree branch—it bends. Because children's bones are soft, that happens. I suspect that bone strength is also weakening, making greenstick fractures more likely to occur.

To prevent that, rather than practicing the vaulting box, we have no choice but to have them move their bodies in their daily lifestyle habits.

The fact that they no longer play outside is really significant. There are also circumstances where they can't be allowed to play outside.

There's no space either, is there?

Also, nowadays parents both work and have little time with their children. In that case, they can't be left outside, so it seems that movements experienced naturally in nature are decreasing.

Therefore, recently we have been proposing that "play" should be done more consciously. In the past, one could naturally experience intense movements through play, but those things are disappearing, and there are fewer playmates, so they don't play in groups.

It is also said that this has a huge impact not only on the body but also on the mind. If they start from playing and moving their bodies becomes fun, it can lead to sports later on, or they can just enjoy it as recreation. I think the beginning is important.

That's right. In the prevention of dementia, "dual-tasking" is often mentioned. In other words, doing something else while doing one thing. For example, the function of not just walking, but walking while doing something, is the first to decline as a cognitive function.

Conversely, traditional children's play is like a cluster of dual-tasking. And it was also a place for practicing human relationships. The fact that such places do not exist is indeed a major problem.

If they understand that there are all kinds of children in a group, both older and younger, I don't think they will become exclusive toward things that are different from themselves. I also think that if they are only given limited groups set up like a school class, reactions like ostracizing often occur when a child with different elements enters.

There is something I wanted to ask Mr. Ueda. For example, in high school baseball coaching, there is a way of thinking that if you want to make them strong, you impose strict practice. But what you advocated in your coaching was "Enjoy Baseball." I thought that meant that unless the children practice voluntarily, they won't become strong in the true sense, although it contains various meanings.

When you were actually coaching the Juku High School Baseball Club, what kind of things were you conscious of, not to mention the amount, frequency, or content of practice? In fact, you have led the children to Koshien four times, winning through what can be called the most competitive district in the country.

In a word, wouldn't it be about being eighty percent full? On a sunny Saturday, they gather after class ends. If I say, "The weather is great. Shall we take today off?" they keep practicing forever (laughs). If they were exhausted from being thoroughly worked, no one would stay after it's over. So I think it's the opposite.

I also don't like saying "you guys do everything on your own," and I think that's impossible for high schoolers, but if you take them to the launch pad to some extent, teach them how to do it, and then step back a bit and watch, they start doing it themselves. That's the most enjoyable part. They even change the signs on their own. When I think, "I'm seeing a sign I don't know," they say, "We changed it yesterday." I say, "Tell me!" (laughs).

Many people say it's impossible at other schools, but I think it can be done at any school if you let them try. Yukichi Maeda (former manager of the Keio University Baseball Club) also used to say that often. It's about the instructor keeping it at eighty percent full and letting the students think for themselves and improvise on their own.

Nowadays, they take videos themselves and exchange opinions, or research by watching YouTube. I think that's the interesting part.

If you use a coaching method that makes them eat until they are stuffed, today's kids will either quit the club or get injured. There's not much good in it, is there? Restraining the instruction to about eighty percent full. This is a learning experience.

Then, they will do it until I say "stop." Strangely, it's the opposite. My job was to say, "Go home early, go home."

That probably isn't limited to baseball. Recently, small-group education and interactive education are frequently mentioned in the field of education. For example, if you divide them into small groups, give them a theme, and have them discuss it, unexpected ideas come out. It means it stays with them more than memorizing in a lecture.

On the other hand, there are times when you absolutely have to drill in necessary knowledge, but the importance of discussion is frequently mentioned and practiced in the field of education as well. What you just said is exactly that. Create the place and say, "give it a try."

Teach and pull back, teach and pull back.

So in reality, the children's baseball skills actually improve.

I believe so. The most interesting thing is when a player who didn't blossom in high school says, "I want to play in university." I try to stop them for a moment, saying, "Maybe you should go down a different path" (laughs). Then, they become a regular in university, play in tournaments, and come to me looking happy with an outstanding player trophy, saying, "Professor, you told me to quit, didn't you?" (laughs).

Since he was the type of kid who did weight training diligently, he grew steadily in university and seemed to be used at the right timing.

There is a graduate student named Eri Nozawa who is researching under me in the Doctoral Programs of the Graduate School of Health Management. She was a high-level tennis player who made the national team during her active years, and now she wants to level up her abilities as an instructor while working as a tennis coach.

She is my senior by one year.

Regarding her research theme, she says that when she coaches university students, even if they were great players in high school, some grow smoothly after entering university while others don't grow at all. She doesn't think the innate talent is that different, so she wants to investigate what makes the difference and apply it to coaching.

Nozawa's hypothesis is that at high schools with high-level tennis, students live in dormitories or similar environments with solid instructors, where practice methods and times are managed, allowing them to lead a life immersed in tennis, so to speak. In a sense, it's an ideal environment, and in such an environment, children who can thoroughly reproduce what they are told will grow.

However, in university, the environment changes to one where independence is required, including food, clothing, and shelter. They must manage their daily lives properly on their own and face tennis while thinking for themselves. Children who can do that grow further, while those who think "University doesn't teach me anything, unlike high school" do not. She thought it might be a clear polarization.

I agree. In the case of tennis, there are many families where parents have been with them since they were juniors, taking them to schools and tournaments or watching them one-on-one, so I think there are many situations where everything is prepared for them until about middle school without the child having to think about anything.

Even in high school, some parents are still very enthusiastic, and some children cannot fully become independent. When they become university students, they really have to be independent, but I think there are indeed people who cannot think for themselves when that happens.

There is the term "life skills." I think it's fine to think of it as the problem-solving ability necessary for living. As the next step in Nozawa's research, she interviewed nine people who were top-level students during their university days within four years after graduation.

She asked what those people learned from their coaches or directors during their university days, or what they learned on their own, and how that improved their problem-solving abilities. It turned out that the keys were indeed the ability for self-reflection, communication skills, and the ability not to blindly accept everything the coach says.

I understand that very well.

When told something different from what they have been taught so far, whether they can judge how to digest and incorporate it within themselves, or whether to discard it.

This is an ability that cannot be acquired just by playing tennis. I think it would be good if instructors viewed baseball or tennis as tools to plant those seeds, so to speak.

Hearing what you said earlier, I thought that Mr. Ueda is indeed providing human education while coaching baseball.

Often in winter and such, I would have people in management—who have high problem-solving abilities completely unrelated to baseball—give lectures. They would be given a theme like: "A 7-Eleven opened near a bakery and the bread stopped selling. What should be done to revive that bakery?" and they would talk in groups. Some kids say that was the most fun part of their three years (laughs). It's not about baseball at all.

But those things also translate into baseball. In other words, they start to think about how to get better. I was doing nothing but things like that. Since they didn't have to practice and it was easy, they probably did it happily (laughs).

I have been the director of the School of Medicine Basketball Team for about 20 years. Since all students in the School of Medicine become doctors, they have to study even more after graduation than they did as students. Rather, student days are a time when they can take time away from studying, and the significance of playing sports there is very large.

Rather than cultivating problem-solving abilities while facing patients and diseases after entering society, I think there is great meaning in experiencing defeat and frustration as a student and training to think about how to overcome it—that is, how to win even one more game. Basically, the people in the School of Medicine are all excellent, so if they think hard, they usually find solutions.

I believe that trial and error in sports during student days, and things not going as planned, is what's important. If things don't go well after becoming a doctor, it's already "out" (laughs). Being a doctor is a profession where you must only play matches you can definitely win. But as a student, you can experience losing a match.

I also serve as the chairman of the Juku Athletic Association Basketball Team, and indeed, encountering adversity before hitting various problems after entering society is an opportunity in life. I believe that experiencing and learning what to think and what to do in such times will surely be useful in their later lives.

I want students to cultivate human strength through such experiences. Even if you say "I am a graduate of Keio University," it won't get you anywhere once you enter society. But I always tell them at graduation to become the kind of person where, when someone says "That guy is pretty good. What's his career path?" and hears "He's from the Keio Athletic Association," they say "Ah, I see."

Sports are fun in themselves, but I also think they are an unparalleled tool for education, and there's no reason not to use them.

I suppose if I told this story to Yochisha (elementary school) students, they probably wouldn't understand (laughs).

It is exactly as you say. It may be difficult to convey this in words to Yochisha students, but there are times when I feel that even elementary school students feel a sense of unity and elation when they win at a sports day, or a sense of self-affirmation. I approach my instruction wanting to give them many such experiences.

Rather than trying to make them good at tennis as elementary schoolers, they study through tennis. I treat it with the feeling of "Japanese, Math, Science, Social Studies, Tennis."

The difficult part is that if they don't actually get better at tennis, the children's eyes won't sparkle. "Being able to do something you couldn't do" is one of life's greatest joys, so it's important to make that happen for them.

Another point where sports are excellent as an educational tool is their interactivity. Even if the other person is an elementary school student, when you teach something, something always comes back to the teacher. So there must be many things where you are learning while you think you are teaching.

What I think while actually teaching university students is that in physical education, individual past experiences vary greatly, and it also differs depending on what kind of feelings they had when taking physical education classes until then. I am in charge of aerobics, and there are quite a few kids who aren't very good at exercise but thought, "It doesn't look like there's competition, so maybe I'll try it."

In my classes, I never say "This is wrong." We just keep moving, and while they mimic the teacher, if I say "It's okay if you can't do it," quite a few kids are surprised that they don't get scolded for not being able to do it. Once that anxiety is dispelled, they can realize "I was able to do this much," and I can see that even for university students, that becomes a great source of confidence.

I see, that's interesting.

This sense of "I did it" is common to everything, so I try to have them set little goals for themselves like "I want to go this far," and help them understand that clearing those goals builds confidence and leads to fun. I tell them that then they can tackle things enjoyably even if it's not exercise.

Whether or not you can create this "motivation" yourself is very important, and I think being able to feel yourself changing by moving your body in sports can be one big trigger for that. Exercise definitely changes you if you do it. And if you do it properly, it almost never turns out badly, so even university students can gain some confidence.

On the other hand, while there are many kids who do physical education because they like it, I think there are quite a few kids for whom it is painful. I want to at least dispel that when they are university students. If they go out into the world still hating exercise, the number of people who "don't exercise at all" will increase.

This is especially common among women. They can't take the fact that they "couldn't do it" lightly. If you tell them "It's okay to be like this," they realize "Oh, I see," and they change completely. It's exactly the same for children.

That is an important thing. If you give a task and evaluate those who can do it as A and those who can't as C, it's bad. All the kids who can't do it will end up hating it.

In particular, there are huge individual differences in bodies, and advantages and disadvantages exist at the starting point to begin with. So, I think if each person can have slightly different goals, they can each work hard.

Regarding Mr. Ueda's story about "eight-tenths full" earlier, is that something you devised from your experience? Were you doing things intensely at first?

At first, I decided on the menu strictly. Even things bordering on harassment (laughs). Now, when I say these things, people say, "I can't believe you say that."

But from a certain point, I thought, "These guys have the ability to think, so it's easier for me if I utilize that." Even after I go home, they do practice properly and safely. They think for themselves properly; it's amazing. They read books on nutrition, anatomy, physiology, and so on, and they are incredibly knowledgeable about things like physiology. They also think about training theory.

I don't know if starting from the head is good or not. I tell them, "Even if you know it, it's the same if you don't practice" (laughs).

So, you gradually moved in that direction through the process of your experience.

I failed before. As expected, I made them throw too many balls and caused injuries. In the summer of 2005, there was a time when we were one win away from Koshien. There was a pitcher named Nobutaka Nakabayashi (now JFE East Japan). In the semifinals, it went into extra innings against Tokai University Sagami, and we won that, but the next day, a typhoon luckily came and there was a day off before the finals, so I asked, "Can you go?" Of course, he said "I can go." It's one more win to Koshien.

During the game, he said, "I heard a bit of a strange sound," and I changed him in a hurry, but because of the injury at this time, his start at university was delayed a bit. He says, "I don't regret it," but even now I think, "I should have changed him a little earlier then."

I still say "I'm sorry" to him about 100 times whenever we meet. He won 20 games in university, so he says he doesn't mind, but it's difficult because I'm full of regrets.

There are stages in a child's growth, and especially for middle schoolers, there is a period called the growth spurt where growth occurs suddenly, and sports injuries occur frequently during that period. In high school, the speed of growth slows down, so injuries are less likely to occur than in middle school. I think there are appropriate ways to play sports according to each age stage.

For example, Mr. Matsunaga, you are currently teaching elementary and high school students. Of course, you probably change your teaching methods, but is there anything you are consciously doing?

I teach elementary schoolers five days a week and high schoolers two days a week. In the case of tennis, it is currently popular to use sponge balls instead of actual hard tennis balls for lower elementary school grades.

There are two reasons for doing so: first, the burden on the elbow is extremely reduced. The other is that the ball doesn't bounce too much. For elementary schoolers, hard tennis balls bounce high, making them quite difficult to hit. Using a sponge ball that bounces enough to be hit at one's own hand level is just right.

Is there anything like that in baseball?

Recently, tee-ball has finally come out, which is soft and doesn't hurt even if it hits you. Instead of a pitcher throwing, you put the ball on a batting tee, hit the stationary ball, everyone goes to pick it up, and then sits in a circle holding hands. A professor from Tsukuba devised it and is trying to spread it.

In tennis, if you use sponge balls, you can set up four simple nets on one court to create simple courts. Therefore, many people can enjoy tennis in a small space.

Without teaching how to hit a forehand or backhand, we start by saying, "Anyway, anything goes, try playing a game using this sponge ball and net."

In the old days, we used to do it with our hands (laughs). With a soft tennis ball, just playing around.

It's an image close to that.

But it's closer to playing tennis than doing practice swings. Consequently, the fun of tennis is conveyed better that way, isn't it?

That's right. It's very fun even when played between adults and children, and it's quite hard for an adult to beat a child; it becomes a pretty good match.

That's great for the children.

Mr. Ueda, you are now teaching middle and elementary school students as an instructor for school-age baseball rather than high school. How does it change when the age of the audience changes? Is it the same as high school and university students?

No, it's completely different. Elementary schoolers completely look down on me (laughs); they hang off me or kick me from behind. It's like I'm playing together with them like that.

If I only taught rules or gave instruction on "how to swing a bat," they would never come near. If I say let's play like this for a bit, they say "Wow, I want to do it!"

It's a good experience. They don't listen to people at all. Even if I explain earnestly, they are looking the other way and playing, and it's hard to get them to gather (laughs).

So you must not say, "What are you guys here for? Listen properly."

I must not. But it's interesting. They gather on their own to have meetings, and when I let them play a game, they say "Time" and gather, mimicking professional baseball to change defensive positions themselves; it's interesting to see the potential.

In children's baseball, adults shouldn't get too involved. I think letting them do it within play is the best way for them to grow.

But it takes quite a bit of courage for an instructor to provide that kind of instruction, doesn't it? One tends to think they must teach the basics first, or that the bat grip should be like this.

They hold it backwards and swing (laughs).

It seems that if you let them move as they wish first, and after they've finished a round, you say "Okay" and gather them to teach basic things, the children will come and listen properly. If you do "Okay, listen" and "Okay, do this" from the beginning, they don't seem to listen at all.

Professional baseball players are no good because they try to teach properly. I think those people really don't understand (laughs). Even if they think the kids will listen because they are pros, it doesn't matter to a child who comes.

Mr. Matsunaga, you are a former professional player, but did you feel any gap when you first started instructing Yochisha and high school students?

I feel that I was indeed pushing the image of the education I received at school onto the children. I interacted with them as if I had to say something educational or act like a teacher, taking a stance of 'teaching' them, which naturally led to resistance.

I realized this wasn't working, so I read books like John Wooden's on basketball coaching and studied in my own way to see if interacting with them like that would work better.

Ultimately, it's the players who play the game, so no matter how much the bench tries to intervene, they can't win the game themselves.

Speaking of basketball, those who come from elite schools are often deeply influenced by their high school teacher's style. In high school, for example, when a team is about to lose, a good coach was someone who could take a timeout and give precise instructions like 'do this play.' In university, you can't win with that alone. Teams where players can think for themselves about how to respond to the opponent's play are the ones that are truly strong.

From my perspective, the members of the School of Medicine Basketball Team are very intellectual. To be honest, their level isn't high, but when they take a timeout and return to the bench, there's almost no time for the coach to interject (laughs). Technical terms that I don't even understand are flying around. This is especially noticeable when they are losing a game they expected to win.

That's wonderful. It's ideal.

In reality, they aren't actually that skilled. However, hearing the words flying around during a timeout, you'd think, 'Are these guys pros?' (laughs). I think that's a very good thing. That's why it works better to let a student chosen through discussion among the students act as the coach.

Baseball in America is completely different from Japan. In Japan, coaching for children is often strictly about the basics, saying 'you must do this,' but in America, it's more like 'as long as you can hit it far' or 'it's fine to catch it with a backhand.'

I think a big part of this difference is that they play sports on a seasonal system from a young age. Instead of doing only one sport, if you think of it as just looking after them for three months, you think, 'I'll make it fun so these kids will want to play baseball again next year.'

In Japan, people do one sport, and they do nothing but games all year round, focusing solely on winning and not teaching sportsmanship at all. Even for elementary school students, it has become something like a martial art.

Indeed, if it's baseball, they do nothing but baseball all year round. Originally, it's important to do various sports. Diversity is especially important during the growth period, but is a seasonal system difficult in Japan?

It's probably impossible with the current sports organizations. It would be great if someone could take the lead for elementary school students, though. I think even just two seasons would make a significant difference.

The mindset of the instructors needs to change. For example, even if a child initially joins both soccer and baseball youth clubs, once they reach a certain grade, they are told to choose one. The desire to do both isn't accepted. That's a pity, and I wish there were an environment where they could be allowed to do both.

Baseball became linked with Bushido, and with blood, sweat, tears, school spirit, and self-sacrifice combined as discipline, it became 'Yakyu-do' (the way of baseball). If anything, Keio University is more Americanized; there is a history where Yukichi Maeda advocated 'Enjoy Baseball,' and that spread.

But I wonder. Isn't the ratio about 9 to 1 nationwide? (laughs). If you said 'Enjoy Baseball,' you used to be mocked. You'd be called strange just for having long hair. At the Koshien opening ceremony, they march like the military. It felt creepy, so when I said, 'It's fine, just walk normally,' they got very angry and made me write an apology letter.

That is 100 years behind the times.

As an initiative of Keio University, I have been providing sports medicine consultations at affiliated schools for over 20 years. When people go to a hospital for a sports-related injury, they get an X-ray and are told, 'There's nothing abnormal. You're overdoing it, so take a rest,' and that's it. But for the individual, that doesn't solve anything.

While continuing these consultations, I realized the most important point is to dispel the parents' anxiety. In other words, when children come home saying their knees or back hurt, the mother is at a loss. When they go to the hospital, they are told nothing is wrong. But it hurts. If she says, 'Then take a rest,' the child says, 'I don't want to miss practice.' All that stress accumulates on the mother.

Those are symptoms of over-exercising, and while they aren't that severe and the pain will go away with rest, if they return without changing their physical conditioning, it will recur 100% of the time.

First, I have the child, who is the party involved, understand this. When I say, 'You don't have the basic physical strength yet to keep up with the practice of the Juku high school baseball team, so your back starts to hurt. Try building up the basic physical strength to keep up with practice first,' the child says, 'I understand,' and goes for a run. When the mother can understand that as well, it greatly reduces the stress.

Then, because the individual understands why it hurts, recurrences naturally decrease. If they only practice pitching intensely, children's elbows and shoulders will break. It's not just a matter of how to throw or their form; it's important to build a body that can perform proper kinetic chains, strengthening the area around the hip joints and the core to transmit the power of the large muscles in the lower limbs to the fingertips of the upper limbs.

I believe that being able to conduct initiatives like sports medicine consultations as part of improving the educational environment is something unique to Keio University.

Not limited to the Athletic Association, I strongly feel that I want those who were involved in sports at Keio to either continue sports themselves or become spectators after graduation, but also to definitely move into the area of nurturing children. In addition to 'Shin-Gi-Tai' (mind, technique, and body), I strongly hope they become graduates who 'learn and pass it on.'

I think it was very good to hear various suggestive stories from everyone's experiences in the field today. I sincerely hope that Japanese youth sports will move in a better direction in the future. Thank you very much for today.