[Finals - Team 3 vs Team 12 Singles 1] Sanada vs Fuji

[ashore]

its all subjective about if fuji get 1 point or not. but at least most are in agreement he loses.
people could argue and reason for points over and over. these 2 players we haven't seen much action from them in the manga.

its true as a genius he has potential to score a point or 2.
but as good as sanada is, and not to mention he's seen fuji's counters before and he has black aura and lightning speed near teleportation, theoretically
and subjective he can seal all of fuji's current counters with his special moves.

only way i can see fuji scoring a point(my opinion of course) is if his well rounded tennis skills/play are better than sandada... is that he case? probably not.
OR fuji would have to evolve during the match and make 1,2, or 3, new counters.

sanada seems like he'd be merciless and play serious and would force fuji into a wall in a one sided match, in which case it would force fuji to evolve.

 

[Fayte]

*waves the white flag for Fuji's corner*

 

[Phantron]

If you remove all the special effects, it's pretty clear Tezuka, Yukimura, and Sanada are all on the same 'god' tier of rallying for MSers. That is, if any of these two started rallying with no special moves whatsoever it is possible the rally might never end. There's no indication any of those 3 can beat any other in rallying without using some kind of special move.

Well we know Yukimura can return all special moves effortlessly in a rally. You can say maybe returning special shots is his speciality, but it's not like Tezuka or Sanada is particular weak against lesser moves. Niou, when copying Tezuka, can unconditionally return the 5th counter. No explanation is even needed. Sanada certainly can return random moves Ryoma was copying as if they're normal shots.

So your first hurdle is from counter 1-5, it is entirely possible Sanada simply returns them unconditionally without even a need for explanation due to his god tier status in rallying.

While the 6th counter is probably high tier of a move that it cannot be returned without explanation, there are two problems:

1. Sanada has no tendency of hitting cord balls, which is required to set up the shot.
2. The 6th counter seems to be hard to return due to the fact the ball actually bounces into the audience stand in some crazy trajectory. Problem is Sanada can teleport, so he can simply run up to the audience stand and return it.

Note that Shiraishi was unconditionally returning Fuji's counters until Fuji powered up, and Shiraishi's rally skills cannot be the same tier as Sanada/Yukimura/Tezuka.

Even if Fuji has improved his base stats such that his counters can no longer be unconditionally returned, assuming they still do similar to what they started out as, then counter 1-3 can be returned by Rai because again teleport can catch up to any kind of crazy trajectory. Counter 4 is useless because Sanada does not rely on putting spins on balls. The only possible way Fuji can win is if he powered up his 5th counter to the point it's on the same level as Tezuka Phantom, and then you get a repeat of Rai vs Tezuka Phantom. It seems pretty unlikely for 5th counter to be as hard to return as Tezuka Phantom given Tezuka, as powerful as he is, has to risk significant injury to do Phantom, while 5th counter is not known for any side effects.

It's pretty clear the more dangerous the tech is the bigger payoff is, though of course even if Fuji can get to Phantom level of tech without inflicting significant damage, of course Sanada still has Rin, which unconditionally beats Phantom type moves and have no side effects.

I didn't include Black Aura because Fuji has no screen time on NPOT so I'll just assume his off the screen improvement cancels out Black Aura and then some (i.e. assuming 5th counter can evolve to a point of being as strong as Phantom is a lot of improvement) since Fuji is known to make ridiculous improvements.

 

[Ninomiya]

Actually Phantron,
After Sanada broke out of Yips at 4-1, Yukimura proceeded to take the next points to 7-1 whilst Sanada was out of Yips.
So actually Yuki is shown to be better at rallying.
But yeah they always have been in the same tier.

Hold on a second, you're going to tell me that Sanada can not only use Rai to teleport around the court, but he can teleport into the audience seats?
Are you serious? That's Sanada-ism.
It would be okay if you were just supporting Sanada, but you've been going way out of proportion to assume he can easily return 6th Counter and teleport what would be more like 100m distance.

6th Counter is near impossible to return. It flies up into the air in Fuji's court, so you can't catch it in the air before it rises like Hakuryuu.
It is so high in the sky it cannot be seen at all. It vanishes from sight.
It then causes a firework display. Making it even harder to notice the ball.
It then crash lands randomly. Remember it cannot be predicted where it lands. Baseline or in the middle of the court or wherever.
Once it lands, it flies straight into the audience at a ridiculous speed.

You want to tell me Sanada will teleport into the audience, return it, then teleport back into the court to continue the rally?
That's just pushing things way too far. It's a ridiculous assumption.

---------- Post added at 05:24 AM ---------- Previous post was at 05:21 AM ----------

About Fuji's ridiculous improvements, wouldn't that be linked to the plot?
Or is it because it's about Fuji who a lot of people don't like on here is the topic that we will suddenly remove this.

 

[ashore]

i asked this before.. how does hoshi hanabi work? fuji his a cord ball on the net the ball rolls over the net into opponent's side of the court ( on the ground) then flys up in to nowhere?

after the ball touches the ground on the opponent's side and rises up , at that point, sanada could rush to return it. if the ball just rises on fuji's side of the court, then is projected out to the audience, that dont make sense, that would be out of bounds.

 

[TheShiraishi]

i asked this before.. how does hoshi hanabi work? fuji his a cord ball on the net the ball rolls over the net into opponent's side of the court ( on the ground) then flys up in to nowhere?

after the ball touches the ground on the opponent's side and rises up , at that point, sanada could rush to return it. if the ball just rises on fuji's side of the court, then is projected out to the audience, that dont make sense, that would be out of bounds.

http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page013.html
http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page014.html

These are the the explanations we have for Hoshi Hanabi. Hoshi Hanabi is (so far, the ultimate Counter) and you guys are brushing it off like it's an easily returnable technique.

Before you Sanadaists read this post yes I know the prerequisites for Hoshi Hanabi would make the chances of Fuji hitting a Hoshi Hanabi against Sanada very unlikely. Even so:

http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page012.html

The way I see it, it crash lands at a very, very high speed. Not too good with space stuff, but the drawing of the ball is like a meteor. This leads me to believe that it's an instant technique, just like Sanada's Rai teleportation. We haven't seen him teleport into the air which means to return this he'd need to teleport out of the court and then into the stands to return it. Assuming his legs don't give out and he makes it, it would require much more power and technique than usual for Sanada to Rai it back onto the court... I mean of course it is Sanada. Not saying he can't do it.

What I am saying is Hoshi Hanabi isn't returned just like *that*. Once the cord ball is hit, it's almost a guaranteed point. Fuji hax FTW

 

[Phantron]

I'm not sure why being able to teleport to where the audience is too much of a stretch given Rai is described as 'speed of light'. If you got that kind of speed it should be pretty easy to run to just about anywhere to return any shot. I mean Ryoma can run up where the ref is sitting at to do Cool Drives, and he actually has no inherent speed techs (though he is surely very fast). We know Ryoma's speed is slower than the teleport speed of the Higa guys (otherwise he'd have no reason to copy that tech against Atobe). Rai seems to be obviously another tier above Higa teleport speed, so why shouldn't you be able to run to where the audience is with that kind of speed?

So far as ridiculous improvements go, I do not subscribe to the stuff like "Ryoma/Fuji can never lose by necessity of plot', but it's clear these two gets unusually high improvements when facing superior opponents. This is probably because they start out with lowish stats as the underdog. Compared to that, if you take say Tezuka or Sanada, they rarely start out as the underdog (Tezuka is sometimes underdog as a function of his previous injury, but never as a function of his stat against someone not in his tier) and their stats are generally far superior than anyone they face, so they rarely get any meaningful improvements. Note that prior to NPOT the improvement to Sanada/Tezuka are just 'I decided to unseal a previously forbidden tech', i.e. they didn't actually improve any. Fuji obviously improved a ton from pre semifinals, to semifinals, and finals.

---------- Post added at 08:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:32 PM ----------

http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page013.html
http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page014.html

These are the the explanations we have for Hoshi Hanabi. Hoshi Hanabi is (so far, the ultimate Counter) and you guys are brushing it off like it's an easily returnable technique.

Before you Sanadaists read this post yes I know the prerequisites for Hoshi Hanabi would make the chances of Fuji hitting a Hoshi Hanabi against Sanada very unlikely. Even so:

http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page012.html

The way I see it, it crash lands at a very, very high speed. Not too good with space stuff, but the drawing of the ball is like a meteor. This leads me to believe that it's an instant technique, just like Sanada's Rai teleportation. We haven't seen him teleport into the air which means to return this he'd need to teleport out of the court and then into the stands to return it. Assuming his legs don't give out and he makes it, it would require much more power and technique than usual for Sanada to Rai it back onto the court... I mean of course it is Sanada. Not saying he can't do it.

What I am saying is Hoshi Hanabi isn't returned just like *that*. Once the cord ball is hit, it's almost a guaranteed point. Fuji hax FTW

The problem is that Tezuka, Sanada, and Yukimura all have this inherent property of 'returning crazy shots like it's nothing'. Niou, when copying Tezuka, returned 5th counter as if it's nothing and 5th counter sure sounds like a pretty crazy shot too. You can't base on how hard a shot is return by its description because otherwise half of the shots in POT shouldn't even be returnable. How many times have you seen soandso use a technique that's said to be unreturnable and then his opponent does a power up and hit it back like it's nothing?

While Fuji is certainly destined to be in the "Tezuka-tier", he has yet to be recognized as one of these members by someone of the Tezuka-tier and that's pretty much the only way you can get into this club. The closest recognition came from Shiraishi but again he's not a Tezuka-tier character (though he's also very close). Yes random guys are always saying how awesome he is but random guys also say one of the Fudomine fodder guy is as much a genius as Fuji, so if we buy the opinion of random guys that means Fuji must absolutely suck at tennis. I swear some random spectator must have said Kaidoh is stronger than Tezuka at some point (yeah right). The point is, you can't take the opinion of anyone outside of Tezuka-tier characters when it comes to evaluating potenital.

While his moves certainly look Tezuka-tier worthy, someone in that tier (Yukimura, Sanada, Tezuka, and Atobe) has to formally invite him into the club or he'll always be susceptible to the 'Tezuka-tier guy return the shot like it's nothing", like the Niou vs Fuji game (and Niou's clone isn't even close to Tezuka tier honestly). Atobe got in when Yukimura interrupted the game where he just learned World of Ice, and no one else at this point has been invited to the club yet.

And of course in the end you can just say Sanada doesn't hit cord balls on purpose so even if this shot is 100% unreturnable it'd only have a minimal impact on the game. 6th counter seems to only be developed to deal with Shiraishi who purposely hits cord balls to counter 5th counter. But if you can hit 5th counter cleanly over the net (no reason to assume Sanada can't do this), you wouldn't exactly get very many opportunities to do the 6th counter.

 

[ashore]

http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page013.html
http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page014.html

These are the the explanations we have for Hoshi Hanabi. Hoshi Hanabi is (so far, the ultimate Counter) and you guys are brushing it off like it's an easily returnable technique.

Before you Sanadaists read this post yes I know the prerequisites for Hoshi Hanabi would make the chances of Fuji hitting a Hoshi Hanabi against Sanada very unlikely. Even so:

http://read.mangashare.com/Prince-of-Tennis/chapter-364/page012.html

The way I see it, it crash lands at a very, very high speed. Not too good with space stuff, but the drawing of the ball is like a meteor. This leads me to believe that it's an instant technique, just like Sanada's Rai teleportation. We haven't seen him teleport into the air which means to return this he'd need to teleport out of the court and then into the stands to return it. Assuming his legs don't give out and he makes it, it would require much more power and technique than usual for Sanada to Rai it back onto the court... I mean of course it is Sanada. Not saying he can't do it.

What I am saying is Hoshi Hanabi isn't returned just like *that*. Once the cord ball is hit, it's almost a guaranteed point. Fuji hax FTW

the descrtiption of fuji's counter dont make sense....

1) hits a cord ball
2) the ball fllys instantly in the air

WAIT: doesn't the ball have to hit on the opponents side of the court? if not its like hitting a home run out of the stadium.

3) lands in audience...

I missed the part where it hits on the opponent's side of the court?

 

[Phantron]

the descrtiption of fuji's counter dont make sense....

1) hits a cord ball
2) the ball fllys instantly in the air

WAIT: doesn't the ball have to hit on the opponents side of the court? if not its like hitting a home run out of the stadium.

3) lands in audience...

I missed the part where it hits on the opponent's side of the court?

I think it's basically just a lob shot, but it picks up insane speed due to going so high in the air and gets crazy trajectory that has something to do with the wind and the fact that the shot started on a cord ball. Sounds like just an enhanced version of his third counter really, i.e. more speed + even crazier trajectory.

 

[Hardy]

the descrtiption of fuji's counter dont make sense....

1) hits a cord ball
2) the ball fllys instantly in the air

WAIT: doesn't the ball have to hit on the opponents side of the court? if not its like hitting a home run out of the stadium.

3) lands in audience...

I missed the part where it hits on the opponent's side of the court?

Fuji throws the ball high, the opponent can't see it, then the ball lands on the opponent's side and finally flys away. It's kinda like Taki's Acceleration Lob in FtST lol

I have a question now: fuji NEEDS a cord ball in order to hit it? Is it too crazy to think that now he improved enough to hit 6th counter without a cord ball?

 

[Phantron]

Fuji throws the ball high, the opponent can't see it, then the ball lands on the opponent's side and finally flys away. It's kinda like Taki's Acceleration Lob in FtST lol

I have a question now: fuji NEEDS a cord ball in order to hit it? Is it too crazy to think that now he improved enough to hit 6th counter without a cord ball?

The cord ball is a necessary condition. I mean that's the whole point of a 'counter' shot, no? If he can do it at will they wouldn't really be counters. Aside from the 5th counter all of Fuji's shots are physically dependent on some kind of criteria that's not controlled by him (wind, spin, etc). I don't see Fuji being able to do counter moves at will unless he got formally introduced to the Tezuka tier level. In fact I'd say it's because he needs to depend on the opponent to do something, as opposed to all the Tezuka-tier have moves that simply just work on their own, is why he is currently not in this tier yet.

 

[ashore]

if the ball is thrown high then will hit the ground.... then it should be returnable. also if it isnt returnable, how come he lost to tezuka tnK?

 

[Hardy]

The cord ball is a necessary condition. I mean that's the whole point of a 'counter' shot, no? If he can do it at will they wouldn't really be counters. Aside from the 5th counter all of Fuji's shots are physically dependent on some kind of criteria that's not controlled by him (wind, spin, etc). I don't see Fuji being able to do counter moves at will unless he got formally introduced to the Tezuka tier level. In fact I'd say it's because he needs to depend on the opponent to do something, as opposed to all the Tezuka-tier have moves that simply just work on their own, is why he is currently not in this tier yet.

If he isn't returning a cord ball, he would be still depending of the wind.

if the ball is thrown high then will hit the ground.... then it should be returnable. also if it isnt returnable, how come he lost to tezuka tnK?

We don't know, he probably sealed 5th and 6th counter with Teni Muhō No Kiwami, or used Tezuka Phantom/Zone to reject/atract the ball while it's still in the air. This last one is not really probable, cause Niou said "there's nothing I can do" when he saw the first 6th counter.

To return it you have to be able to know where the ball will be without seeing, and then hit it fast enough before it bounces away. Like a Blindfolden Super Ultra Hyper Rising Shot.

 

[ashore]

well i assume there are high tier players that dont need eye sight to play tennis. so that's easy to counter the flashing part of the 6th counter. i guess thats where the fireworks come in. but i didnt see the audience get blinded by the fireworks, but i guess its different from the opponents point of view.

 

[Fayte]

What I am saying is Hoshi Hanabi isn't returned just like *that*. Once the cord ball is hit, it's almost a guaranteed point. Fuji hax FTW

Let's list the "hax" techniques Sanada has already overcome:

• Tezuka Zone (Ka)
• Hyakuren Jitoku no Kiwami (Rai)
• Saiki Kanpatsu no Kiwami (In)
• Tezuka Phantom (Rin)
• Zero Shiki Serve (KaRinRai)

Are you seriously saying Sanada would really be at a disadvantage here even if he hit cordballs all day? Just look at the facts. Sanada has single-handedly defeated arguably the most overpowered player in the entire (PoT1) series 7-5. I really don't think Hoshi Hanabi is doing anything against him.

 

[Phantron]

If he isn't returning a cord ball, he would be still depending of the wind.



We don't know, he probably sealed 5th and 6th counter with Teni Muhō No Kiwami, or used Tezuka Phantom/Zone to reject/atract the ball while it's still in the air. This last one is not really probable, cause Niou said "there's nothing I can do" when he saw the first 6th counter.

To return it you have to be able to know where the ball will be without seeing, and then hit it fast enough before it bounces away. Like a Blindfolden Super Ultra Hyper Rising Shot.

? The 6th counter depends on cord ball + wind. The wind gives the ball the crazy trajectory, and who knows why you need a cord ball but that's what the manga says.

Niou is much weaker than the regular Tezuka (Fuji says it himself), let alone TnK Tezuka. Niou can return the 5th counter as if it's nothing while copying Tezuka, so why wouldn't the real Tezuka be able to do so too? Tezuka would have no need to hit cord balls, because he can hit the 5th counter back cleanly. For that matter, why bother with cord balls to begin with when you got a tech like ZSS?

Plenty of shots in POT are said to be 'hard to return' but again, the Tezuka tier characters have shown to be able to return 'hard to return' shots like they're nothing. Yukimura's ability to return stuff is well documented. Tezuka has Hyakuren + TZone, and even an inferior version of Tezuka (cloned) can return 5th counter cleanly. Sanada can hit through Tezuka's techs, who is arguably the strongest tech-based player out of MSer (I consider Yukimura's tech more mental in nature). Atobe can return any technique Ryoma was copying, including Ka, like they're nothing. The 'hard to return' doesn't apply to the Tezuka tier of characters. They simply return any tech lower than their tech as if it's a normal hit, and Fuji has never been accepted into this tier even though he's definitely going to be in there some day, which means until one of those 4 guys say "Yeah Fuji now is on our level" all his techs are considered trivial to these guys.

For a good example of the difference between mere mortals and the Tezuka tier, at the beginning of NPOT, Oishi was using his Moon Volley and there's the usual 'Oishi's move lands exactly on the baseline!' praise from fellow teammates. Yet, Sanada back in the game against Ryoma can simply lob a shot to baseline 3 times in a row and it's said that he can do it a thousand times in a row if he wanted to.

When Niou cloned Tezuka, he served with the Hyakuren aura and got an ace, but we know Hyakuren aura actually does nothing for a serve (there's nothing to double at this point). Yet, a normal person would have a hard time scoring on Fuji using any kind of serve techs. This means for Tezuka, even the cloned version, his regular serve is stronger than just about any named serve tech (I sure don't see anything outside of Mach Serve/Zero Serve getting an Ace on Fuji). There's a consistent theme of the Tezuka tier characers where a lesser character's tech is just a normal hit to them, and conversely a normal hit for them is MUCH stronger than a lesser character's best move.

The "Tezuka destroys the dinosaur" smash, while a bit of overkill, captures this surprisingly well. We know Tezuka has no smash based techs but his normal smash might as well be Big Bang when viewed in the POV of a lesser player.

 

[FrostyMouse]

No, no, do not mention that movie, Phantron. The dinosaur moment is single handedly responsible for the vast majority of the Western manga world believing that PoT is DBZ tennis.

 

[Hardy]

No, no, do not mention that movie, Phantron. The dinosaur moment is single handedly responsible for the vast majority of the Western manga world believing that PoT is DBZ tennis.

I started to think that when I watched the Nationals OVA. Until Kantou's finals, PoT was almost believable. Ryoma vs Yuki was just too much, the series became Saint Seiya of Tennis.

Phantrom, I don't know why you wrote those 4 last paragraphs, seriously. Sometimes you go crazy and just write a lot that doesn't have anything to do with the topic lol. I was talking about the 6th counter.

 

[Fuji Shusuke]

I reckon Fuji can make opportunities to score points with Sixth Counter. If he uses Fifth Counter, he can force Sanada to hit a cord ball. You may be thinking, "but Sanada has Rin." Well, in Sanada's match with Tezuka, when Sanada used Rin on Tezuka Phantom, the ball still had spin on it but it wasn't enough to make it go out. I reckon we can safely assume it can happen for Fifth Counter. The ball's spin will be softened but the ball will have enough spin to force a cord ball. Since it's a cord ball, pretty much all speed and power on the ball is cancelled, giving Fuji an opportunity to score with Sixth Counter.

If you argue that Sanada can run to the stands with Rai, Fuji can challenge him to an endurance match which will result in Sanada's legs becoming swollen and unusable.

 

[ashore]

imo sanada dont have to run to the stands, but is able to get to the ball as it launches up from the net, or when it hits the ground on his side of the court.

Note: in pot 1, when niou says its impossible to return, it is referrring to himself and his skill level, based on his opinion. I bet others on tezuka,sanda, yukimura tier players and higher can deal with it.