(10 episodes, aired on weekdays over the next two weeks)
What’s it about ?
Well, the title says it all. An anime adaptation of a best-selling light novel that’s basically an infomercial for Peter Drucker’s Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices.
Characters
Minami, our protagonist and new manager of the high school baseball club. She used to be quite good at the sport, but quit years ago because of a yet unclear incident that made her hate it. Anyway, she buys Drucker’s book by mistake while looking for some documentation on what she’s supposed to do, and proceeds to read it because, hey, what the heck, she spent the money and had better get some use of it.
Yuuki, Minami’s best friend for years and former manager of the baseball club. She’s got some chronic illness that put her in the hospital (with scheduled surgery down the line). Obviously she was in no shape to continue with the club, which is why Minami pitched in and takes it very seriously.
Ayano seems to be the assistant manager or something. Very shy, she doesn’t make much of an impression so far.
We don’t get to see too much of the actual baseball players yet, beside that they’re not much good and only a few are motivated enough to even come training. The pitcher only sees baseball as a line on his resumé for his future business, and so on.
Production Values
Below average. There’s no flair whatsoever to the directing, the animation’s cheap, and the soundtrack is so generic it hurts.
Overall Impression
Ouch. This is even worse than I was expecting. Low production values, exposition through omnipresent narration that never lets you forget that this adapts a novel, no attempt to conceal the blatant advertising for Drucker’s book, one-dimensional characters… and of course it’s baseball, one of the few sports I have zero interest in.
And yet… it’s a sports anime, and I’m a sucker for those due to being brought up on the likes of Captain Tsubasa and Attacker You !. I’m still quite curious about how a general “Management” book could be of any use for a sports team : the “Mission Statement” stuff this episode was already straining it a bit, how is the next chapter of “Marketing” going to be relevant ?
So yeah, I’m going to keep watching it mostly for the novelty value. And it’s going to be over quickly anyway.
