Shinto is not a religion which controls behaviours of believers according to a doctrine or commandments, but a faith that lets people have direct contact with Kami (the deity or the deities). Accordingly, worshipping and ritual ceremonies are regarded to be especially important.

In recent years, the arrival in the United States of players like Ichiro Suzuki and Hideki Matsui has enlightened Americans about the popularity of the sport in Japan. But most Americans don't know that Japan has almost as long a baseball history as the United States.

The exact date that baseball was introduced in Japan is not known, but it is attributed to American professor Horace Wilson sometime between 1867 and 1912. The Japanese people were immediately intrigued by western baseball, seeing psychological similarities between baseball and their native sports of sumo and martial arts.