Japan not thrilled with Netflix-controlled World Baseball Classic

World Baseball Classic final. Japan ahead of the United States by a run. Bottom of the ninth. Two outs. Full count. Shohei Ohtani on the mound. Mike Trout in the batter’s box. The slider. The swing. The miss. Ohtani throwing his glove in celebration, then his hat.

In Japan, the sequence three years ago was more than an iconic baseball moment.

Ohtani’s strikeout of Trout was watched by 46% of homes in the Kanto region, which includes Tokyo. This was a shared experience, something priceless.

Or so Japan thought.

Today, less than two months from the start of the next WBC, the island nation is coming to terms with a once-unthinkable reality: Moments like that have a price.

Netflix has the exclusive broadcasting rights for the WBC in Japan.

Without a subscription to the streaming service, not a single game can be watched – not Samurai Japan’s tournament opener against Taiwan on Mar. 6, not the tournament final 11 days later in Miami.

“It’s really unfortunate,” former Samurai Japan infielder Shinya Miyamoto said on his YouTube channel.

Netflix is relatively inexpensive in Japan – less than $6 a month with advertisements and less than $10 for standard service – but the price isn’t the source of ire.

Paying to watch sports on television, or paying to watch anything on television for that matter, is a relatively new concept in Japan. And while domestic league baseball and soccer broadcasts have gradually migrated to subscription-based platforms in recent years, national team games in major international competitions have generally remained on free television.

Streaming service DAZN has the rights to the upcoming World Cup soccer tournament, but exceptions were carved out for Japan’s games to be shown on network television.

That won’t be the case for the WBC, for which Netflix is believed to have paid close to $100 million for the rights, according to Japanese news reports. The cost represents an increase of fivefold from the previous tournament.

Miyamoto, who was part of the Japanese team that won the inaugural WBC in 2006, pointed out how the event was founded with the intention of increasing the sport’s popularity. He argued that removing the tournament from free television contradicted that mission.

Will older fans have trouble installing Netflix on their televisions? Will fewer children have access to the WBC, depriving many of them from being inspired by Ohtani the way Ohtani was once inspired by watching Ichiro Suzuki take on the world?

Nippon Professional Baseball commissioner Sadayuki Sakakibara told reporters last week that he remained hopeful of a compromise being reached, raising the possibility of tape-delayed broadcasts of Japan’s games on network television.

“I think it would be good if there was an environment in which ordinary people could watch games on terrestrial television in some form,” Sakakibara said.

News reports on the subject often call Netflix a kuro fune, or black ship.

The references are to Commodore Matthew C. Perry’s 1853 arrival in modern-day Tokyo Bay, which marked the beginning of the end of Japan’s isolationist foreign policy that lasted for more than 250 years. Japan was essentially forced into signing treaties that opened it up to uncontrolled foreign trade, which devastated its economy and transformed its culture.

Then again, when the Dodgers visited Tokyo last year, similar complaints were voiced about how individual tickets for their games against the Chicago Cubs were selling for well over $1,000 on the secondary market.

Nonetheless, the two games between the Dodgers and Cubs drew capacity crowds, as did their exhibition games against Japanese teams. Tickets were sold to watch the teams practice and those sold out, too.

Fanatics announced $40 million in merchandise and trading card sales at the Tokyo Series, a company record for special events.

Ultimately, the desire of the locals to see Ohtani conquered their apprehension over elevated prices. Netflix is counting on the same outcome here.