If there was any defining moment for Japanese sports last month, it surely came right after Turkey eliminated the lads in blue from the World Cup on June 18.

While the nation briefly mourned Japan's loss, a group of erstwhile soccer fans in Osaka stood at the edge of a river and -- rather than jumping in -- began singing the Hanshin Tigers fight song.

It was a poignant reminder that while it may be fun to paint your face and watch the World Cup, baseball is closer to the hearts of most Japanese sports fans.

That's the way it's always been. For most of the years since the J. League's establishment in 1993, attendance at baseball games has been twice as high as the average soccer match. And soccer's total attendance of 33.6 million over those years falls far short of baseball's 201.5 million.

Some folks just don't want to hear the facts. With the arrival of the World Cup, soccer enthusiasts across the country indulged in four weeks of wishful thinking.

Nobody cares about baseball anymore, they said. The World Cup will make soccer Japan's most popular sport. There's no cure for football fever. Can't you just feel the excitement!

If that was the case, you'd probably think the "World's most watched sports event" would have put a dent in baseball attendance.

Think again.

News photoKoji Uehara and his Yomiuri Giants are back in the spotlight -- although a recent poll says they never really left it.

Baseball is more popular than ever. Average attendance last month jumped to 27,319 -- a 2.7 percent increase from the previous June -- while Central League games were up 10.3 percent and the Tigers' attendance skyrocketed 35.2 percent.

Or to put it another way, while 1.44 million people attended World Cup matches in Japan, 2.65 million bought tickets to watch baseball.

The unexpected rise in baseball attendance was even more remarkable because the leagues did not play any games on June 9 and 30 -- both Sundays, when teams usually expect their largest crowds.

Nor was baseball's attendance propped up by the arrival of 480,000 foreign tourists. Much of the World Cup audience has already left Japan, but all those baseball fans are still here.

So there you have it. While the 2002 FIFA World Cup Korea/Japan produced the tournament's lowest attendance since 1982, baseball is headed for its best season ever.

Japan found a cure for football fever. It's called baseball.

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So now that the World Cup has come and gone, it's time to catch up on Japan's favorite sport.

With just one week remaining until the All-Star series begins, the Pacific and Central League teams are taking shape.

If there was any clear winner in the All-Star balloting, it was the Hanshin Tigers, whose players won the vote in five of 11 CL categories after the team started the season with seven consecutive wins.

Unfortunately, the Tigers put forth a less-than-All-Star effort in June and the team that two months ago had fans ready to celebrate by plunging into polluted rivers took a different sort of dive via an eight-game losing streak.

The only question remaining is who will be the first player slapped senseless by Hanshin's hot-headed skipper Senichi Hoshino? My money's on Kei Igawa, who has had such a spectacular first half (9-4, 1.78 ERA) that the only way for him to go is down.

But Igawa isn't the only one who's earned his ticket to the All-Star Games. Tuffy Rhodes led the Pacific League tally with 1.24 million votes, and for good reason.

The Osaka Kintetsu Buffaloes slugger has launched 28 home runs in 63 games, which puts him on pace to end the season with 58 homers -- three more than the single-season record he shares with Sadaharu Oh.

There's only one question I want to ask Oh, who will be a PL coach at the All-Star Games: "Did you give Tuffy any advice today on how to hit a ball three feet outside the strike zone?"

As Hawks manager last year, Oh sat on the sidelines in feigned ignorance while his pitchers threw junk balls to Rhodes, thereby denying Tuffy a chance to break the record.

It's a good thing Rhodes is a lot more easygoing than Barry Bonds, otherwise -- with Oh sitting on the same bench -- the All-Star Games might turn into a slugfest in more ways than one.

And so might the next Orix BlueWave game. Last month, the Kobe team went through a tailspin, losing seven of their last eight games while evicting the Chiba Lotte Marines from the Pacific League cellar.

That has caused tempers to flare in the Orix clubhouse, where manager Hiromichi Ishige and team owner Yoshihiko Miyauchi blasted Fernando Seguignol and Scott Sheldon for failing to push the team into the win column.

Seguignol's response: "How can we help the team win if we're sitting on the bench every day?"

At the opposite end of the PL spectrum, the Seibu Lions have managed to hold onto the league lead even without ace right-hander Daisuke Matsuzaka, who has been nursing a sore elbow since the middle of May.

It's still not clear whether Matsuzaka, who led PL pitchers with 877,229 votes, will even be ready to pitch next week but things are looking up for Fukuoka Daiei Hawks closer Rodney Pedraza.

Pedraza, the PL's most popular relief pitcher with 639,315 votes, has been sitting on the sidelines the last two weeks with a pulled hamstring, but he recently told The Japan Times that he'll soon be back with the Hawks and looks forward to pitching a couple of innings against the CL team.

The All-Star series kicks off July 12 at the Tokyo Dome and concludes the following night at Botchan Stadium in Matsuyama, Ehime Prefecture.