Athletes to Entertainers: What's the Appeal?
Hello everyone! I hope you are having a great morning/day/afternoon/evening!
For this article, I thought it would be a great idea to share with you some of the best sports-themed web series!
I really love sports-themed media - dramas/web series, movies, TV shows, variety shows… I can never have enough! If you would like to read some reasons why I love the sports genre so much, you can read my previous article on the topic by clicking here.
What makes a sports-themed web series great in my opinion:
SPORTS IS THE MAIN PART OF THE STORY AND/OR AT LEAST A DECENT CHUNK OF THE STORY! (Sorry. If you are a fellow sports genre enthusiast, you will be no novice into being tricked into watching something that has been categorised as ‘sport’ but is actually ‘99.9 % romance and 0.1 % sport.)
Team Work/Bromance/Sismance. This is a common theme with all of these selections. Of course, a sports-themed web series does not need to include it, but really I think it should. Sure, some sports can be played alone, but without some sort of teamwork/hard work development arch, it would become boring, would it not?
And of course, like with all other categories, the most important thing… is that they are great! Well, in my opinion anyway, otherwise I wouldn’t have included them in the selection!
Now onto the main event. These are the sports-themed web series you must give a watch!
Note: I have included a ‘Sports Rating’ which will rate how much ‘sport’ occurs in the drama. Of course, this ‘Sports Rating’ is just the opinion of the author. Descriptions of these dramas have been used from the reviews of the author and edited slightly to make the article easier to read and more enjoyable.
Thumping Spike (2016)
Country: South Korea
Episodes: 20
# of Watchers: 13,500
MDL Rating: 7.7/10
Author Rating: 8/10
Sport: Volleyball
Sports Rating: 7/10
Favourite Character: Hwang Jae Woong (Song Jae Rim)
Thumping Spike is a very good and heart-warming sports-themed short-length drama that can easily be binge-watched. When it comes to the typical drama in the sports genre, the storyline isn't too different from those in the same genre, but it wasn't predictable either, which is what I think was needed here.
When sports dramas are either too unrealistic or predictable, it can ruin the drama for me, or at least the sporting elements and thankfully, Thumping Spike and its creation of the Daehan Volleyball Team (the name of the volleyball team in this drama) had the right characterisation and chemistry to avoid this potential catastrophe.
Expect superb acting, a superb cast, and superb sporting scenes that really make you feel like you are part of the front row crowd!
The OST was absolute perfection! Every song made my heart flutter! I was also pleasantly surprised by the production value, I thought the camera work was done perfectly.
I put this as the first choice because not only is it the most popular (perhaps you have already watched this or have considered watching it at one point) but I think it is probably the easiest to follow. Of course, the others are easy to follow, too, but with Thumping Spike you can just really sit back and relax!
Fly The Jumper (2020)
Country: Taiwan
Episodes: 4
# of Watchers: 619
MDL Rating: 7.7/10
Author Rating: 9.5/10
Sport: Basketball
Sports Rating: 9/10
Favourite Character: Zhang Jian Yi (Wu Nien Hsuan)
Fly the Jumper has a heart-warming and inspirational storyline with accurate, likeable and realistic characters that viewers will love from start to finish. It was written perfectly, with episodes being concise to the bone, the plot never felt rushed or dragged out, and each episode ended in a way that made me want to watch more instantly.
The range of characters, at first, was a little overwhelming. Honestly, I thought that some characters would be irrelevant due to episode length and size, but each and every character had great development, likeability, and fulfilment by the end.
And to not underestimate how good this web series is, as someone who never ‘rewatches’ anything, this is only one of two drama/web series I have ever re-watched! I am also seriously contemplating re-watching it again! Anyways, I recommend anyone and everyone to watch Fly the Jumper, whether you are an avid sports fan or not!
Our Baseball (2019)
Country: South Korea
Episodes: 10
# of Watchers: 331
MDL Rating: 7.8/10
Author Rating: 9/10
Sport: Baseball
Sports Rating: 6/10
Favourite Character: Sung Shi Eun (Park Jeong Hwa)
Our Baseball is a wonderfully produced, acted, and written sports (mini series) drama that showcases life on this world, the wonders, the mystery, the pains to be forgotten, in a baseball format.
It is one of the strongest sports dramas I have ever watched and I think everyone, no matter if they are a baseball fan or not, would love this. It had a near-perfect balance of sports and story, and the fact that each episode mainly focused on a different player in the team made it always an interesting and unpredictable watch. The different dynamics of people and their everyday lives, whether they feel lost or abandoned in society, all make for a great message that there will always be someone going through something similar, even in the same community as you (in this case, baseball team).
Each episode is quite short but there will always be the right amount of story in each one. The OST here was quite non-existent but played its part well when it needed to, which I personally think is the most important role of an OST: to not 'take over', but to 'add'.
All in all, this is a definite recommendation to watch, even if you're not much of a sports fan! I think everyone will love Our Baseball, perhaps even more than I enjoyed it!
Two Hearts (2019)
Country: South Korea
Episodes: 6
# of Watchers: 611
MDL Rating: 6.9/10
Author Rating: 8/10
Sport: Football/Soccer
Sports Rating: 7.5/10
Favourite Character: Yoo Seon Woo (Park You Na)
Two Hearts is a great short-length sports drama that actually focuses on: guess what - the actual sport it is portraying! (unlike other short-length sports dramas I've been a fool to watch in the past… *ahem* Blue of Winter *ahem* Matching! Boys Archery).
Two Hearts also includes a great bromance, the perfect amount and style of romance, and other issues such as teamwork, never giving up, fighting to the top of the ladder etc. which is quite prominent in this genre. I think this shows that even I, someone who isn’t the biggest fan of romance, can like romance if it is done in a certain way that compliments a genre that I strongly like (sport).
The main things I liked about Two Hearts were the acting, characters, and story: in that order from first to third. The acting has to be good with sport-themed dramas, and everyone delivered above and beyond my (already high) expectations. There was a perfect blend of characters that gave a perfect balance of underdog athletes, jealous girls, genuine girls, strict coaches etc. which is what is needed in a sports drama. The story isn't very different to those before it but it is great enough to warrant it a mention. I guess that proves a story doesn’t have to be unique in order for it to be great.
United Win (2022)
Country: China
Episodes: 12
MDL Rating: 7.5/10
Author Rating: 10/10
Sport: Mixed
Sports Rating: Not good enough to rate/10, but teamwork around sports and the psychology of being an athlete is the bigger picture in this drama
Favourite Character: Tian Xin (Kang Qi Xuan)
United Win is the greatest friendship-themed drama I think I've ever watched. Sometimes, it's the small imperfections that make things perfect, which I think is applicable for this drama. What I mean by this is that, sure, there were a couple of things I would have liked: slightly longer episodes for greater character development (for the supporting cast), perhaps more 'sports' scenes in the first half of episodes, a slightly slower pace. But when I think about these things I desire, and then I think about the tone of the story, I think United Win did something very clever here.
The characters were perfect. They were acted amazingly, and despite the short episodes, you could really feel the emotions they wanted to garner from the audience. Another thing was the story. The friendship was absolutely unreal in this one. It really felt like I was part of the team. Whether you call it bromance or more than that, that's up to you to decide. But this drama made me feel really happy at the end of it all.
On a side note, the supporting character Tian Xin (played by actor Kang Qi Xuan) is perhaps my favourite comedy character in dramaland of all time. Yes. He was that funny. I'm not saying he's definitely my top spot, but my goodness, he's definitely in contention. While I did say I would have liked longer episodes for greater character development for the supporting cast, this doesn't mean I didn't like them. On the contrary, I loved all the characters. If we were given more, I would have perhaps loved them even more!
The music reminded me of a throwback playlist I would listen to back on the Xbox 360 days in the years of 2007 - 10, when social media was less dominant and good times were more likely.
I highly recommend everyone to watch United Win!
I’m sure there were many more I could’ve added. I actually had a hard time condensing down this list myself, so feel free to mention some other sports web series down below in the comments section!
I hope you enjoyed reading the article. <3
Edited by: devitto (1st editor)
