Little America – Season 2 Episode 6 “Columbus Starlings LLC” Recap & Review

Columbus Starlings LLC

Episode 6 of Little America season 2 starts with us introduced to Yoshiko and her family. Yoshiko has a passion for baseball and ends up listening in at work via some sneaky headphones and at home while prepping everything ready for a big birthday party. It’s Yoshiko’s, as it turns out, and she makes a wish while blowing out the candles.

Midway through the celebrations, Yoshiko heads down to the basement to watch the baseball, where she witnesses her hero Ichiro breaking records. After a wave of euphoria, she’s hit with overwhelming emotion. Yoshiko begins crying, witnessing a wonderful moment in baseball history but also reminded of her own trials and tribulations to make it this far.

At work, Yoshiko gets inspired and decides to try her hand at baseball. She spends a lot of money, including $1500 on new equipment. However, there’s no women baseball teams. Softball is completely different, as we know, and Yoshiko is determined to break boundaries.

Yoshiko heads around the community, handing out flyers and determined to bring as many women onboard as possible to become one of the Starlings and play baseball in Chicago. Yoshiko has always had a passion for playing, dating back to her time in Japan. She actually came to the US to play baseball but the provisional team was unfortunately disbanded shortly after arriving over from the States. Now though, Yoshiko is determined to get a group together.

However, she ends up causing friction at home when she cuts her hours to put more time into baseball. Her partner is uneasy at the prospects of struggling even more and suggests she reconsider. Yoshiko is determined to do this though and slowly but surely, they end up with a full team.

In doing so though, Yoshiko falls out with her husband, who tells her that as a 42 year old she has no chance of being a pro-baseball player. She likens Paul to a box, telling him that he has no aspirations and she never wanted to be here with a husband and son; Yoshiko is now following her dream no matter what. Paul watches in awe at Yoshiko’s well-edited promotion video on her computer and finally realizes she has real passion for this.

Meanwhile Yoshiko’s group strike out and don’t win, and the dream unfortunately comes to an end. As a result, Yoshiko also loses her passion for baseball too, not wanting to watch anymore.

Paul and Teddy take Yoshiko to a field that he’s bought for her, allowing Yoshiko to realize her dream and practice baseball as before. As Yoshiko hits the ball, the episode ends but we learn that Yoshiko actually returned to school to pursue a PhD in Sports. In 2021, The Starlings got back together and played their first full season. And to this day, the team continues to look for recruits.

The Episode Review

Little America delivers another intriguing episode, this time showing that passion can help you achieve great things. There’s a really nice ebb and flow to this and in fact, it’s one of those stories that could easily have been adapted to the big screen.

I genuinely thought the episode was going to see Yoshiko give up baseball and become a video editor, given Paul’s surprise at her talent, along with his own so-so video editing but alas, it’s great to se Yoshiko still striving to be the best and follow her dreams.