Japan - V.League V1 (Division 1, Women) 2019-2020

YOLO is in the House And Yamada

Okumura, Tashiro, and Inoue starting for Denso

Not sure what kind of hair thing YOLO is sporting but she's got the opposite spot, and receiving. Frankenstein is playing the left side

Some kind of weirdo stream for Kurobe v Toyota. It's like they have a camera trained on the video screen. When someone serves they stand right in front of it

Tashiro is having fun with Sinéad and Okumura

NEC is so sad Koga and Soga are a combined 9/35

I can't understand Japanese but I'm pretty sure these commentators are laughing at NEC. Mocking them.

Sat 19 Oct 2019 Results

VTV doesn't have its act together yet at all. The NEC match blacked out several times, and WTF was with that Kurobe stream? It was like that for at least the first two sets or so, went black for a while, finally came back normal without commentary. The youtube streams are awful. The "Volleyball is My Passion" person is doing something strange. The first Toray v PFU match started streaming --unlisted-- on youtube, and probably Facebook, but then they went dark except for their Wordpress site streaming using JWPlayer. So this is where we are: V.League is now porn.

The night started off nicely (if a little blurry) with PFU taking the first set from Toray. PFU fought hard and I still think they are going to win some games, but Toray were beasts. Ai Kurogo wasn't rostered up, so Mari Horikawa 16/28, Ishikawa and Kulan did the killing.

NEC was a packed home game with strobe lights and annoying drumming. I see where the league is going with this home game business. It's energy. But NEC let their fans down. Misaki Yamauchi is a fine captain for the team, though. Nanami Hirose wasn't rostered up. I'm afraid she's turning out to be a fragile girl. Denso Denso Denso. Maybe NEC sucked so bad because Denso is so good. Tashiro feeding her MBs was lovely. I am going to miss Airi Tahara Nabeya was unsuccessful all night. Surprisingly Denso started Minami Nakamoto and Rei Kudo along with her. Who is Minami Nakamoto? And why was she the high scoring swinger? Isn't Kudo's career over? Trần Thị Thanh Thúy made a brief appearance, no swings.

I only looked in on the Hisamitsu match when the NEC match blacked out and I think every time I visited I witnessed a Fabiana kill, but she was only 7/23. I must have seen them all. Stats look fine for Hitachi offensively. OP Miyu Kubota 9/15 continues to impress. Praises be sung.

Kurobe v Toyota. WTF man. I'll watch it if VTV puts up an on-demand version, but I think they failed that one.

JT is another team who's moved an OH to libero: Yuka Meguro. Hickman Jahstice 15/34 continues to get minutes and is doing well. MB Anna Ogawa 8/11 is looking strong out the gate this season. I think the setter likes her, has a good sense of where she likes the ball. I turned it off when it became a battle of the Big Caucasian Swingers™. Yawn.

And the yawn put me to sleep shortly after the Okayama v Himeji match started. I'll watch the crap stream to see what's going on there. All the usual Okayama NoSmilers put up good numbers, but it looks like Himeji better find a pair of Big Boy pants pretty soon if they don't want to go back to the minors. From what little I've seen of Himeji so far I quite like the diminutive 159cm setter Nao Horigome. She's the one the JVL JVA abused with that prison mug shot of a roster photo. She kind of looks like coach Yoshie Takeshita. She wears one glove like Michael Jackson, she's a Miyashita level defender, and a maniac block coverage machine Two hearts damnit.

Quote from brahmin

One of DAZN announcers Kayako Inaba passed away last week at 38.

How sad. I DuckDuckGo'd around and didn't find anything. I wouldn't know who she is, though. I love all the girl announcers. One of them talks a little lengthily from time to time, but damn. 38 is too young.

The Kurobe v Toyota match is living on the VTV. It's a normal broadcast with no commentary. I wonder what the heck was going on that they have the proper broadcast available now but live it was a camera trained on the big video screen. Maybe that was the only camera hooked up to get out of the building and the others recorded it normally. Very strange.

I wish VTV would get the live rotations feature working properly. It seems kinda cool but it's just wrong all the time. Never seen a libero get on court, and the pics and the names under them rotate at different times. So only at certain points, like a broken watch that shows the correct time twice a day, are the pics and names accurately lined up. And since they are google translated names it's doubly hard to keep track of who "Apricot floating islands plus child" and "Snow pellets tip" really are

Okayama is the bomb. Of course they played Himeji, but they still play Okayama ball. They never try to serve strong (it's like the coach must discourage it), and no one back attacks. They just play defense. And don't smile.

I don't know what Himeji is doing.

OP - They have the MVP of the V2 league last year, Yuko Asazu, mostly sitting on the bench. She's 34 y/old but still solid. New kid, Saki Tanaka, got some U-Experience over the last year and shows promise but she's no Asazu.

MB - They have the Best Newcomer, Best Spiker, and Best Server, Kana Yoshioka, mostly sitting on the bench, and 36 y/old Rie Takaki mostly on the bench. They were instrumental for Himeji last year. I understand Arisa Nagano taking one of those spots. I like Shuna Omoto but she's no Yoshioka or Takaki.

Libero - Captain Sakie Takahashi is awfully short for an OH, but she was mostly for defense/reception, so they made her libero. Himeji has two good liberos already though.

Setter - Seemed Miki Sakurai was going to be the main setter but she hasn't rostered up yet. Nao Horigome is doing great in her stead --sets mostly on the money and she's a great defender-- maybe Sakurai is a better decision maker. We'll see how this plays out.

OH - Current Preexisting Condition, Riho Sadakane, joining the team mid-season last year and benching Kanasugi kinda killed Kanasugi. Sadakane is okay but shouldn't be a Preexisting Condition. Ivna Colombo's reluctance to be happy in the face of losing might drag on the team. It's out of place, and it's hard to see what else she adds to the team. She is taller than the best other option, Mirei Wakita, 170cm, but Wakita plays with a "You guys better keep up with me" attitude that's infectious.

Only two games in but I wanted more from these golden girls. They can reign in the hitting errors, but I don't know how they are going to deal with their defensive spacing issues. Isn't that the Technical People's job?

Quote from Sidney

Fabiana wears jersey #2. She had 11/17 + 4 blocks.

That's a little more appropriate. Every time I looked in she was killing one.

Sun 20 Oct 2019 Results

What a let down. No Okayama or Himeji shit streams to view

Quote from werka

Queen Annie Drews with 29 today. That 5th set serving rampage was just too much for Toray

Jana Kulan receiving She's too tall for that! Nobody else stepped up, though. Toray's going to have a little rough patch until Kurogo returns from whatever is ailing her.