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The story
On the 30th, TV Asahi’s “Hatori Shinichi Morning Show” covered the ongoing Asian Games (Aichi/Nagoya), during which commentator Toru Tamagawa remarked on the medal standings by country, saying, “China’s No. 1, Japan’s No. 2… I guess it really does correlate with economic power.” The show also reported that the day before, on the 29th, Komazawa University sophomore Akira Ochiai had won gold in the men’s 800m, Japan’s first in the event in 64 years. The comment drew mixed reactions on 5ch — some pushed back with “medal count has nothing to do with national strength” and “China was already near the top in medals before its economic boom even started,” while others questioned his consistency, pointing out that he’d previously claimed South Korea’s per-capita GDP had overtaken Japan’s.
Toru Tamagawa shares his take on each country’s Asian Games medal count: “China’s No. 1, Japan’s No. 2… I guess it really does correlate with economic power” — on “Morning Show”
TV Asahi’s “Hatori Shinichi Morning Show” (weekdays, 8:00 AM) covered the ongoing Asian Games (Aichi/Nagoya) on the 30th.
The show highlighted that on the 29th, in the men’s 800m, Akira Ochiai (a Komazawa University sophomore) set a new Games record of 1:44.48, winning Japan’s first gold in the event since Aoi Morimoto at the 1962 Jakarta Games — 64 years ago.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Read the original article here
What people said
To some extent, countries that pour money into sports do have an edge.
What a massive about-face lol
He used to complain about this so much
This guy's reading way too much into it.
Is that just TV Asahi's house style or something?
Basically, wide-show commentators
riff on the "preferred slant" written into the script,
phrasing it their own way —
I think Tamagawa's just bad at that part lol
Poor countries can't exactly afford to focus on sports.
Once he's decided "it must be this!" he can't change his mind.
The USSR was a sporting powerhouse even while its economy was a total wreck, so there's clearly no real correlation.
Background and Key Points of This Debate
Toru Tamagawa is known for airing his own distinctive opinions on TV Asahi’s information programs, and he has previously claimed that South Korea’s per-capita GDP had overtaken Japan’s. Against that backdrop, his latest remark — that “medal count correlates with economic power” — landed on ground already primed for questions about his consistency as a commentator. It’s not unusual for population or economic scale to be cited as one factor behind medal counts at international competitions, but there are plenty of counterexamples: the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc nations during the Cold War were sporting powerhouses despite being far from economically prosperous, showing that a simple correlation doesn’t tell the whole story. Because Tamagawa’s comment was made on a general information show rather than a sports program, his unverified “personal opinion” was also free to spread without expert scrutiny — likely fueling some of the backlash. What split opinion in the thread wasn’t so much whether the claim itself was right or wrong, but how much weight people were willing to give a “personal opinion” aired over public airwaves.
*This article excerpts and summarizes the 5ch (Entertainment/Sports Breaking News+) thread “[TV Asahi] Toru Tamagawa shares his opinion on each country’s Asian Games medal count: “China’s No. 1, Japan’s No. 2… I guess it really does correlate with economic power”.”
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