What are your favorites in the genre?
My own current favorites are Run with the Wind and Aoashi. Would love to discover more like that.
Ping pong is the one of the only anime’s I’ve ever seen. It’s pretty good.
Yuri on Ice. People who haven’t watched it tend to only know that it’s gay, which it is, but it’s also just an incredible sports anime because a) it’s very true to life in the way the sport and training for it works and b) the protagonist’s opponents are portrayed as actual sports competitors instead of as villains - by the end, you almost don’t care who wins because you want all of them to win. Also the competitions felt extremely tense and exciting to watch. Also they really crank up the animation budget for important competition scenes.
The first 3 episodes are hard to get through - way too awkward to watch - but after that it becomes an incredible show, imo.
This is a great show, I really enjoyed it too. I wasn’t really interested in skating beforehand, but ended up very invested in both the relationship and the competition by the end.
- Haikyuu! Sports anime about volleyball. Even if you don’t care for it as a sport, I’d still heartily recommend it. The visuals are great, the characters are really well-developed and I don’t think I’ve seen a more hype-creating anime than this one. Seriously, if you like those really hype moments and/or arcs in shounen anime, you’ll love Haikyuu.
Haikyuu!, Slam Dunk, and the Prince of Tennis are all amazing!
I loved Hajime no Ippo, a long series but an amazing comedy and drama sports anime.
We saw some episodes of keijo. Is is fun if you want to try something different
ahem The correct title is Keijo!!!!!!!! 🤓
Baby Steps is a really good Tennis manga, not sure if there was an anime adaption or if it was good or not. I’m a big fan of Yowamushi Pedal, which might be more well known for its in universe anime “Love Hime”'s fake OP.
haikyuu
Chihayafuru.
I’m not really interested in anime or sports, but I recall enjoying One Outs.
I watched Kuroko no Basuke as it aired, and had a blast.
It’s a basketball anime where some players have ridiculously cool powers. Would highly recommend it, it’s very bingeable and highly rewatchable. The premise is MC enters High School. His former teammates were legendary and have all gone to separate schools too. They all are competing against each other to get their teams to win, the story follows our MC and his journey to that. I would say, watch the first 3-4 episodes. If you don’t find that fun, you may not like the rest.
Blue lock is quickly becoming one of my favorites. I do echo everyone else here saying haikyuu though!
I’m not sure if you can class it as “sports anime” but I enjoyed Air Gear.
Yawara! - a judo manga / anime by Naoki Urasawa (better known for Monster and 20th Century Boys)
