By Midorikawa Michiyo, Niihama-shi Chronicle

November 5, 2011: Niihama, Japan – Apparently distraught over his team’s resounding defeat in the Neo-Tokyo Cup, Niihama-shi Ghosts clubhouse attendant Tomomi “Tommy-boy” Tomonaga – mysteriously elevated at the start of the season to the post of General Manager – attempted harakiri today, flinging himself out a window at the team’s corporate office.

Fortunately, it was a second floor window and he suffered only a broken toe.

The incident occurred two days after the Edo Battousai completed a swift four-game sweep of the Ghosts in the 2011 Neo-Tokyo Cup.  “Tommy was inconsolable after the sweep,” said a source who witnessed the attempt.  “He locked himself in his office, sobbing loudly for hours.  Then suddenly he burst from the room, shouted, ‘I am humiliated!’ and jumped out the open window.”

Tomonaga landed on some shrubbery and never lost consciousness.  He was taken by ambulance to Sumitomo Besshi Hospital in downtown Niihama.  A spokesman there said, “Mr. Tomonaga suffered a hairline fracture of the right hallux, as well as multiple but minor contusions and lacerations.  He was treated and released.”  Translation: some cuts, bruises and a broken big toe.

Tomonaga, 67, had been the locker room attendant for the Ghosts for many seasons, but as the Chronicle first reported, new Ghosts owner Akane Kenkyusham decided he didn’t want to spend any money on a General Manager.  “Our janitor could do just as good a job,” he said prior to the 2011 season.  Aides took that literally and promoted Tomonaga.

Now Tomonaga is home, recovering.  “Tommy is truly old-school,” said our source.  “To him, jumping was the only honorable thing to do.  He just doesn’t count floors very well.”  In traditional Japanese society, suicide has long seen as the appropriate moral course of action for a man in certain situations who otherwise faced the loss of his honor.

That loss of honor stems from the Ghosts’ excruciating postseason collapse.  After winning more games than any other team in the LRS during the regular season, Niihama-shi struggled against the Shin Seiki Evas for the Shining Star Group pennant.  The club escaped only with a wild 16-9 win in the seventh game of the Wasei Junkesshou.  Then the team encountered the chainsaw known as Edo Battousai, who sliced through Niihama-shi’s lineup and handily won four straight games.

And so the Ghosts’ 2011 ends precisely as it began – with the club and its fans in turmoil.  Our source believes Tomonaga will be quietly relieved of his duties, though it remains to be seen if owner Kenkyusham will this time hire a replacement with actual professional experience in baseball.

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