Haikyu!!'s "Quitter's Battle": Why Ennoshita's Comeback Wrecks Japanese Fans Who Played School Sports — "I quit too. Some days it still feels like I betrayed myself."

Japanese fan reactions (excerpted from 271)

• @yu_zu_mikan👍 2,180

  "Chikara Ennoshita" — what a name to come up with. ("Ennoshita" sounds like en-no-shita, the unsung support beneath the floor; "Chikara" literally means strength.) The Wakunan match is one of my favorites too.

  縁下力なんて名前よく思いついたよな。和久南戦は私も大好きです。

• @h1natarosu👍 6

  Daichi and Ennoshita — those names are too perfect for the two guys who hold the team up. ("Daichi" = the great earth; "Ennoshita" = the support under the floorboards.)

  大地と縁下なんて、チームを支える名前としてピッタリすぎる

• @Dark-wl8wt👍 1,809

  A space that's comfortable, relaxing, completely ordinary — and yet unbearably hard to sit in. What an incredible way to write that.

  快適で、リラックスできる空間で、日常で、 物凄く居心地が悪いって凄い表現

• @霧空夢👍 1,169

  And what makes it even better is that the two other guys who quit right before this are shown to be perfectly happy and thriving.

  この直前で辞めた2人はイキイキしてるって書いてるのもまたいいんだよな

• @れおた-y2w👍 365

  It affirms that the two who quit are genuinely having fun — and only then says Ennoshita wasn't like them. That's so Haikyu!!, a story that's really about what a school club is. I love it.

  やめた2人が楽しそうにしてるのを肯定した上で縁下はそうじゃなかったというのがあくまで「部活」を描くハイキューらしくて好き

• @woo839👍 297

  Everyone in Haikyu!! is committed to volleyball, but the series validates both the people who treat it as their whole life and the people who treat it as just a club activity. That balance is what makes it great.

  ハイキューは全員がバレーに向き合いながらも、バレーを人生と捉えてる人と部活動と捉えてる人の両方を肯定してるからいいバランス。

• @syouryu4397👍 44

  It really feels like no choice here is the wrong one. Both paths are affirmed.

  本当に後悔のない選択って感じする どっちの道も肯定されてて

• @アマトン👍 27

  Haikyu!! is a fundamentally good-faith manga — it avoids showing the ugly side of people, or if it does, it flips it later. That's why it feels so comforting.

  ハイキューが人の嫌なところをなるべく描かないか、描いてもあとでひっくり返してくれる性善説的な漫画だからな。だから心地良い

• @niconicochandayowww👍 452

  I played soccer for 16 years and was stuck on the B-team the whole time, but meeting Ennoshita lit a fire under me again. I gave it one more push, and for my very last year I finally made the starting lineup. I'm genuinely grateful to Haikyu!!

  16年サッカーやっててずっと2軍だったけど、縁下に出会ってまたやる気出てもう1回頑張ってみたら最後の1年間だけスタメンで出場できたから本当にハイキューに感謝してる

• @SkY-qo8vq👍 238

  This genuinely cut deep… No matter how much I practiced my results never improved, and even the underclassmen passed me. I kept using studying — the thing I was relatively better at — as my excuse to stop facing tennis head-on.

  まじで刺さった… 練習しても全然戦績伸びなくて、後輩にも抜かされて。途中途中、比較的向いてた勉強を自分の中で言い訳にしてテニスに向き合わなかったから。

• @オルカ-d8l👍 2

  Yeah, I get it — when you hit a wall, you escape into studying. "Sports take effort, sure, but in the end it's talent, so I'll just study and get into a good university." "They can't study but I can, so I've got the advantage, so I'm the one in the right." You start handing yourself these weird justifications.

  なんかわかるよ、挫折すると勉強に逃げちゃうよな。「スポーツは努力もあるけどやっぱ才能だから勉強して良い大学に行こう。」「あいつらは勉強できないけど自分は勉強できるから将来有利なんだ、自分が正しいんだ」って謎の肯定をしちゃうんだよな

• @葉山薫風👍 101

  I've been through it — right after you walk away, it's easy. No misery, no pain, nothing to suffer through. You get to coast in this comfortable, low-stakes life. But you can't actually make yourself hate the thing you love, so that comfort slowly becomes unbearable, and in the end... you go back.

  経験あるけど、離れた直後は楽なんだな。辛い思いも、痛い思いも、苦しむ事も無い。適当になぁなぁで快適な環境に居られるから。でもやっぱ好きな物を嫌いにはなれないからその環境がどんどん居心地悪くなってきて、結局は戻っちまうんだよな

• @tack5072👍 6

  Long story, but I quit basketball in the summer of my second year of high school, and for a good while afterward it haunted me. I thought about going back, but I'd had real reasons for quitting in the first place, and that urge to return only existed because I was now looking in from the outside — so I never did. Still, deep down I loved being part of a club, both the practice hours and the whole life around it, so I genuinely envied Ennoshita for being the one who chose to go back.

  色々あって高二の夏でバスケ辞めたんだけどその後割と長い間辞めたこと引きずってた 戻ることとか考えたりもしたけど結局辞めるまで踏み切ったことにもそれなりに理由はちゃんとあったわけだし、その戻りたい気持ちもあくまでそれは辞めて外側から見た景色だからこそだったから戻ることもしなかった けどなんだかんだやっぱり部活中の時間もそれ以外で部活所属者として生活してる世界は好きだったからここで戻る決断をした縁下のことは羨ましく感じたりもした

• @JUN-f5j1c👍 17

  I'm on the other side of this — I left brass band just because I got bored and felt it wasn't for me, and I never went back. I still think that was the right call. And yet when I hear a piece I used to practice, my fingers move on their own, and in the same moment I realize there's a piece of regret lodged somewhere in me. Watching this scene amplified that regret so much it physically hurt.

  自分は吹奏楽で単に飽きたとか自分に向いてないって理由で離脱して戻らなかった派。 戻らなくて正解だったと今でも思ってる。 それでも練習した曲を聞くと指が勝手に動くし、同時に心のどこかに心残りがある事にも気が付く。 このシーンは見ててその心残りが凄く増幅されて苦しかった。

• @ねずみ-m4t👍 11

  I feel this. The club I dragged myself to every day got so brutal I never wanted to go, but they wouldn't let me quit. One day I faked a stomachache and skipped — and that day I was hit all at once by relief at being free, a creeping guilt, and the pain of feeling like I'd betrayed the version of me who'd worked so hard up to then.

  わかるよ。毎日言ってた部活、辛くてもう行きたくないって思ってたけど、辞めさせてもらえなくて。ある日お腹が痛いとズル休みして休んだ日部活から解放されたって安堵とどこか罪悪感と今まで頑張ってきた自分を自分が裏切ってしまったような苦しさが襲ってきた。

• @コンブ-k6x👍 1

  This showed up in my feed on the exact day I was planning to hand in my resignation from the club. It kind of broke me a little.

  退部届出そうと思ってた日にこれ流れてきてなんかキツくなった

• @huyu7879👍 16

  I went through the exact same thing. I gave up on tennis and never resolved it, and now as an adult watching Haikyu!! I see way too much of myself in it and just bawl my eyes out.

  全く同じ経験をしました テニスを挫折したまま大人になった今ハイキューを見ると自分と重ねすぎてめちゃくちゃ泣いてしまう。

• @wakefulwombat7167👍 11

  This is a manga I wish I'd met when I was a student. I never got good at my club either — the underclassmen passed me, I couldn't get into matches, I felt like all I did was drag everyone down, like I had no value, and I dreaded showing up every single day. In the end I stuck it out until graduation, crying and throwing up along the way. But looking back now, there were so many ways to contribute beyond playing in matches, and I think the moment you figure out your own strengths and how you fit in is when the club finally starts to be fun.

  学生の時に出会いたかった漫画だわ。 俺も部活上手くならなくて、後輩に抜かされて試合にも出られず、皆の足を引っ張るばかりで今の自分に価値がないとしか思えなくて、部活に出るのが嫌で嫌で仕方なかった。 結局卒業まで泣きながら吐きながら続けたけど、今にして思えば、試合に出る以外にもチームに貢献する方法はたくさんあったし、そういう自分の強みや役の立ち方が分かってきたときに、部活が楽しくなってくるんだろうなと思う。（…）

• @歌好きのすみれ👍 0

  This wrecked me. I did it for two years and was finally a third-year, but I just couldn't click with my teammates and ended up isolated. (…) At the pep rally before the regional tournament, I almost cried watching my former teammates march past in their uniforms. I wanted to run in that uniform more. (…) But it was already impossible. That's exactly why watching Haikyu!! filled me with this huge mix of frustration, envy and excitement. I wanted to fight for a team like that.

  めちゃくちゃ刺さった、2年間やってきてもう3年になったけどどうしてもチームメイトが合わない、孤立してしまう。（…）総体への激励会でユニフォームを着て行進する元チームメイトをみて泣きそうになった。もっとあのユニフォームを着て走りたかった（…）でももう、無理だった。だからこそハイキューを見てると悔しさと羨ましさとワクワクが凄かった。こんなチームで頑張りたかった。

• @ohagi_noZ87👍 15

  I understand this. I ran away too. (…)

  わかります。 自分も逃げました。（…）

• @_gri_ash3844👍 4

  This bit, and the Tokonami match, are the stories that really land for anyone who was in a normal, non-powerhouse school sports club, I think.

  ここと床波戦は一般運動部にはよく刺さる話だったと思う

• @Sirokurosiro_54👍 3

  Haikyu!! is full of these things that only really land if you were in a sports club yourself. It hits different. (…)

  ハイキューは運動部だった人なら理解できるって要素がマジで多くて感慨深い。（…）

• @ROUGAI593👍 83

  Think about it: Karasuno practiced seriously but wasn't a real powerhouse — just a few decently skilled guys — and then a coach with a hardcore elite-school mentality drops in on them. Of course some people couldn't keep up; that's just reality. And the way the story handles it — treating the two who quit not as cowards who "ran" but as people who simply stepped away — is the really good part.

  実際練習は真面目にするけれども、そこまで強豪じゃない、ちょっとだけ上手い人もいる程度だった烏野に、ガチで強豪校メンタルな指導者きちゃったわけで。 そらついていけない人もいるのは仕方が無い。 その処理の仕方が辞めた二人を逃げただけではなく、離れた風に扱ったのも良い処。

• @JUN-f5j1c👍 419

  In the anime, the part where Ennoshita screams "C'mooon, bring it!" — the voice actor was just too good. His voice cracks as he yells, and it's trembling — not vibrato, actually trembling! You can feel him trying to muscle through his nerves and fear with sheer willpower.

  アニメで縁下が「サッ来オオォい！」って叫ぶシーン、声優さんが上手過ぎた。 声が裏返って叫んでるのに声が震えてるの。ビブラートじゃなくて震えてるの！ 緊張と恐怖を気合でどうにかしようとしてるのが凄く伝わってきた。

• @辻竜太-i1y👍 31

  Right?! Toshiki Masuda is genuinely incredible! That scene absolutely got me!

  わかります！増田俊樹さんほんとすごいですよね！あのシーンめっちゃ刺さりました！

• @nagim-hn1mv👍 1

  Here's what's amazing: normally when you sub in, you're filling for someone clearly more skilled than you, so the most you'd think is "don't drag the team down" or "just do my best." The fact that Ennoshita is already a step beyond that, thinking "I have to actually become a replacement for that person" — that alone is incredible. (…)

  何がすごいって、普通代わりで入ったときどう考えても自分より技術が上の人のところに自分が入るわけだから足を引っ張らないだとか自分の精一杯で頑張ろうとか思うはずなのに、縁下はその一つ先のその人の代わりにならなきゃって考えてる時点ですごいと思う。（…）

• @Sato-n6r8y👍 1

  That cold line the senior gives him in the scene where he comes back to the club — it sends a chill through you, doesn't it. (The captain, Kurokawa, snaps at him for wanting back in while still in his school uniform.)

  部活に戻って来たシーンでの先輩の冷たい言葉にヒヤッとするよね

• @のみちん-f9g👍 38

  This, and Mitsui's "why did I waste all that time…" from Slam Dunk — both genuinely pierce you.

  これとスラムダンク三井の「なぜおれはあんな無駄な時間を…」はまじで刺さる

• @Heiderich3807👍 32

  No point saying this about a manga, but in real life people would 100% go "oh look, he came crawling back the second the coach stepped down…"

  漫画で言っても仕方ないけど現実なら｢アイツ監督が引退した途端に戻ってきたぞ…｣って絶対なるよな

• @真壁比呂士👍 6

  Yeah — it landed on me as: the people who don't go "eh, whatever, I'm done" at this exact moment are the ones who grow.

  ああ、ここでもういいやってならない奴が成長するんだなっていう刺さり方した

• @ノエル-w2m👍 24

  You, the person who kept working without letting yourself rot — you're amazing.

  腐らずに努力出来た貴方は素晴らしい。

• @ああ-t4v9t👍 0

  Haikyu!! has moments like this scattered all through it, which is exactly why it's so much richer if you read it as someone who was in a sports club.

  ハイキューってこういう描写ところどころあるから運動部経験者が読むと余計面白い

• @寿司の極みお米👍 0

  No matter what anyone says — that was a "nice receive." I love this part so much.

  誰がなんと言おうと"ナイスレシーブ"だ ここめちゃくちゃ好き