Major 2nd Review: The Son of Baseball's Greatest Player Tries to Find His Own Way to the Game

Quick Take

• The sequel to Major that asks the harder question — what happens to the child of the legendary player who doesn't inherit the legend's gifts
• Mitsuda's treatment of Daigo's lack of exceptional talent is more honest than most sports manga: he is not secretly extraordinary; he has to find what he actually is
• Ongoing; a baseball development manga with unusually thoughtful treatment of legacy and identity

Who Is This Manga For?

• Readers who want baseball sports manga with realistic character development
• Anyone who enjoyed the original Major and wants to see the next generation
• Fans of the "living in someone's shadow" character arc in sports manga
• Readers who can engage with a protagonist who has average ability and exceptional determination

Content Warnings & Age Rating

Age Rating: All Ages Content Warnings: Sports competition; themes of family expectation and personal identity; the emotional difficulty of comparison to an exceptional parent

All Ages rating is accurate.

Yu's Rating

Category	Score
Story Depth	★★★★★
Art Style	★★★★☆
Character Development	★★★★★
Accessibility for Non-Japanese Readers	★★★★☆
Reread Value	★★★★☆

Story Overview

Goro Shigeno was baseball's greatest player — the subject of the original Major manga, a talent who overcame extraordinary obstacles to reach the top of the sport. His son Daigo inherits none of that talent. He is an ordinary player at best, constantly measured against a father who represents the extreme of what baseball achievement looks like.

Major 2nd follows Daigo as he finds his own relationship with baseball — not through discovering hidden talent, but through finding what he can do that his father couldn't, and through the specific ways that ordinary ability, developed with care, produces its own form of excellence.

Characters

Daigo Shigeno — His journey is genuinely separate from his father's — he is not trying to become Goro, and the manga doesn't try to make him one. His development has its own shape, which is the series' most important structural decision.

Supporting ensemble — The teammates and opponents Daigo encounters provide a realistic range of baseball talent and development that makes Daigo's position in that range legible and interesting.

Art Style

Mitsuda's art continues the clean baseball manga tradition of the original Major — the game situations are clear, the character designs are appealingly distinct. The art doesn't attempt to replicate the original exactly, which is appropriate.

Cultural Context

Major 2nd is deeply embedded in Japanese baseball culture — the professional leagues, the high school tournament (Koshien), the development system. The original Major is one of the most beloved baseball manga in Japan, which gives the sequel both an advantage (established audience) and a challenge (established expectations).

What I Love About It

The chapters where Daigo does something specifically because he has had to think harder about the game than his father did — where his lack of natural talent produces a different kind of understanding — are the series' most valuable. He is not lesser than his father; he is different.

What English-Speaking Fans Say

Western readers who came from Major describe Major 2nd as one of the most emotionally intelligent sports manga available — the treatment of Daigo's relationship to his father's legacy avoids the easy resolutions that lesser sports manga would use. Baseball fans describe the game content as accurate and knowledgeable.

Memorable Scene ⚠️ Spoiler Warning

The sequence where Daigo's different kind of baseball intelligence — his understanding of the game through analysis rather than instinct — produces a result that his father's approach would not have reached is the series' most complete expression of what Daigo's story is actually about.

Similar Manga

• Major — The original series; Goro's story
• Cross Game — Baseball with emotional depth and realistic portrayal
• Big Windup! — Youth baseball with pitcher development focus
• Touch — Classic baseball manga about siblings and legacy

Reading Order / Where to Start

Volume 1 — Daigo's introduction and his relationship with his father's reputation.

Official English Translation Status

VIZ Media publishes the English edition. Ongoing; the Japanese run is extensive.

Pros & Cons

Pros

• The treatment of legacy and identity is unusually honest for the genre
• Daigo's development is independent rather than comparative
• Accessible to readers who didn't read Major
• Baseball content is accurate and detailed

Cons

• Ongoing — no complete ending
• Readers unfamiliar with Major may miss some emotional resonance
• The pacing is slower than action-focused sports manga

Format Comparison

Format	Notes
Individual Volumes	VIZ Media; ongoing
Digital	Available

Where to Buy

Get Major 2nd Vol. 1 on Amazon →

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