A somewhat quiet episode this week, leading up to the finale of the season. And the series? Who knows. There’s an OVA (Major’s first) due in December, along with the last manga volume. In theory, we should probably have one more season to finish up the manga – but the OVA may be all we get. We’ll see.

Goro is still in the hospital as the episode begins, along with Watts. He’s about the be released though, and is excited to get back home – only to find the lovely Sophia there. Sophia, if you recall, is the quintessentially American (at least as the Japanese see us) blonde trainer/manager. The Hornets, rightfully pissed at Goro’s somewhat checkered relationship with the truth, assign her to babysit him and make certain he doesn’t try to rehab too soon. Unfortunately, Shimizu calls during the evening and hears her talking to Goro, which leads to all sort of misunderstandings and, judging by the PV, prompts Shimizu to fly to the US and check on her boy. Since Sophia was suggesting marriage to Goro as a career choice, that could prove interesting.

On the field the Hornets win their division series, but it’s all about Gibson vs. Gibson this time. Sparing no sense of the absurd, Takuya Mitsuda gives us a showdown in the 9th inning of game 7, with Junior hitting a HR off Dad’s 102 MPH fastball. 42 year-old Dad, mind you. And this after previously being 0-19 against the old man. So it looks as if it’s Junior vs. the Hornets in the World Series – and I don’t think even Goro can come back and pitch six months ahead of schedule. But with Major, you can never be sure.

Mitsuda definitely did get one thing right – Chicago choked it away in the 9th to lose out on a trip to the World Series. I can speak from experience here – that was a rare moment of realism in this series…