It was nothing like Utah or New England, but Sojourner adjusted quickly. He had been overseas before; as a young man he toured Ireland and England with a New Hampshire all-star team. Travel was something he did well. The new language, the new school, the new cities and people and customs—he took it all in stride. “I never had culture shock,” Sojourner says. “I think the first day when I landed in Japan, all the neon threw me off. I’ll never forget it. You look up, and there’s just neon signs everywhere.” He found Japanese food to his liking. Ton catsu—pork wrapped in breading, mixed with egg and rice—was his favorite dish. Even the eel-over-rice was delectable: “I always thought eel would be nasty,” he says, “but that stuff is good.”
After two seasons at Hamamatsu, Sojourner was a bona fide college star. He could shoot, pass, dribble, rebound, and his quickness created serious matchup problems. In 2002 he was drafted by the Saitama Broncos of the Japan Basketball League. “That was, at the time, the first and only Japan (pro) basketball league,” Sojourner explains. Now a paid professional, he traveled to drafty gyms across the archipelago. In Sojourner’s first two seasons the Broncos played 50 games and won 46. They claimed a pair of JBL championships. Sojourner, his game reaching new statistical heights, led the way both years, averaging about 30 points and 15 rebounds per game. He was named league MVP in 2004.
In spite of this production, Sojourner was woefully underpaid. He made $8,000 his rookie year, then $30,000 the year after. “The pay was horrible. That is the only downside of my whole career,” he says.
Amid this monetary frustration, Sojourner stepped away from the JBL in 2005. He and a few local ballers formed the Sunday Crew, a high-level streetball team that still exists and still participates in Japan’s top tournaments. On the streets, his nickname is “Mr. Fury.” But Sojourner wasn’t finished with professional basketball: In 2006 he suited up for the Takamatsu Five Arrows on Shikoku Island. The Arrows were an up-and-coming club in the fledgling Basketball Japan League; the location was beautiful, and the enthusiastic fans would pack the house. Sojourner stayed with Takamatsu until 2009. He tangled with Ming Ming and a host of talented foreigners, and continued scoring a ton of points. One of his best games made it to YouTube. For the most part, looking back on those years overseas, he enjoyed the Japanese professional experience.
In some ways, both the JBL and the BJ were barnstorming leagues. The refereeing was often questionable—“One thing about Japanese basketball: They love to rig shit,” Sojourner says—and the arenas were occasionally unheated. “It took you like, a half to get warmed up.”
Promotional and advertising efforts were largely ineffective. In Japan, soccer, Sumo wrestling and baseball make the nightly news; pro hoops does not. The BJ-League championship, when Sojourner was still playing, was filmed with a tiny 8 mm camera and broadcast only by satellite and online. Outside the arenas themselves, very few people watched. “The BJ-league could have been so much better if they had put the time into the advertising and broadcasting games,” Sojourner says. “But they did neither.”
He gives an honest assessment of the Japanese game. He played for 10 years, at university and in both leagues, and worked with Japanese youth players. This long resume has given him an insider’s perspective. In Sojourner’s opinion, coaching on the islands is below average. Sometimes the refs would screw him over, nickel and dime him, but his coaches would say nothing. “If the coach doesn’t back you in a game, who’s going to back you?” he asks emphatically. Recalling 30 years of organized basketball, he maintains that his father is the best coach he’s ever had.
Stylistically, Japanese ball—and Asian hoops in particular—is mostly run-and-gun, up-and-down. Teams live or die by the three-pointer, Sojourner says, sometimes throwing up a long shot when a better look is available elsewhere. The Japanese play this fast-paced game largely because of the personnel available. With a few notable exceptions, Asian players are predominately small, quick and built like guards. Sojourner, of course, is a versatile forward, comfortable on the baseline or at the block, and his skill set is more suited to a low post-oriented game plan. Chucking low-percentage threes is not his game.
