is a Japanese baseball

Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...

 manga

Manga

Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...

 series by Shinobu Kaitani

Shinobu Kaitani

is a manga artist from Kagoshima, Japan and a recipient of the 1991 Tezuka Award.His most notable works are One Outs and Liar Game. He has mentioned in an interview that he was inspired to write Liar Game after visiting a local bar in Kagoshima....

 originally serialized in the seinen

Seinen

is a subset of manga that is generally targeted at a 20–30 year old male audience, but the audience can be older with some manga aimed at businessmen well into their 40s. In Japanese, the word Seinen means "young man" or "young men" and is not suggestive of sexual matters...

 manga magazine Business Jump

Business Jump

, is a Japanese seinen manga anthology published by Shueisha under the Jump line of magazines. It publishes various Seinen manga series in Japan. The manga of Business Jump are published under the "Young Jump Comics" line.- History :...

from 1998 to 2006. It was relaunched in Business Jump on October 1, 2008. An anime adaptation by Madhouse

Madhouse (company)

is a Japanese animation studio, founded in 1972 by ex–Mushi Pro animators including Masao Maruyama, Osamu Dezaki, Rintaro, and Yoshiaki Kawajiri. It has created and helped to produce many well known shows, starting with TV anime series Ace o Nerae! in 1973, and including western favourites Ninja...

 began airing on October 7, 2008.

Plot

Hiromichi Kojima, the star batter of the Lycaons, heads to Okinawa to train and bring himself out of a slump. There, he meets Toua Tokuchi, a 110~128 km/h (68~80 mph) pitcher and the undisputed king of a gambling form of baseball called "One Outs". At Kojima's urging, Tokuchi signs up with the Lycaons. His contract, the 'One Outs contract', differs from the usual, though, in that he gets 5,000,000 yen for every out he pitches, but loses 50,000,000 yen for every run he gives up.

Primary characters

Toua is a successful gambler and a pitcher in the game called "One Outs". After losing a game of One Outs for the first time ever to Kojima, he joins the Lycaons with an odd contract, the One Outs contract, that decides Toua's pay based on his performance. As the Lycaons' famed star pitcher, he can pitch entire games without giving up a single hit.

Kojima is the cleanup batter for the professional baseball team, Saikyou Saitama Lycaons. He is defeated by Toua during his time at the training camp after challenging Toua to avenge his relief pitcher, Nakane. After his defeat, he goes into the forest to train himself mentally against Toua but as he trained he injured his wrist. Even with the injury, he decides to challenges Toua to a rematch with the bet that if he wins, he would take Toua's hand. With the One Outs game ending in a do or die pitch, Kojima resolves that he couldn't lose, getting in the way of the ball and making the pitch count as a deadball. He wins the match because of this, albeit not without contention. Toua admits defeat and Kojima makes Toua join the Lycaons, effectively taking Toua's hand and disabling him from gambling ever again in a One Outs game.

Other characters

The owner of the Saikyou Saitama Lycaons team. He is more interested in gaining money than getting the Lycaons to win. He forms the One Outs contract with Toua Tokuchi.

The manager of the Saikyou Saitama Lycaons; Obediently obeys every order given to him by the owner until anime episode 15. In episode 15 he is likened to a dog for his unwavering obedience to the owner.

He is the catcher of the Saikyou Saitama Lycaons and he also notices Toua's talents as he catches Toua's pitches.

The Fingers' starting pitcher and the Rookie of Year for the year before. He also notices how terrifying Toua is when he pitches, he urges the team to try and take a hit, but the result is still the same and his team loses the match.

The Chiba Mariners

The strongest team in Japan for the last 3 years. This team goes against the Lycaons with 3 consecutive games, with their strongest cleanup crew comprising Takami Itsuki, Thomas and Brooklyn.

One of the cleanup batters in the team "Chiba Mariners", he is known to be a prodigy in baseball and his eyes have the best in motion vision in the baseball world. He is the best player in the team and is able to think of counters against Tokuchi's fastballs, until he is outwitted and his team loses.

Episodes

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#	Title	Original air date