Is Major Worth Reading? Review & Where to Read

Quick facts
Format	Manga (shōnen), 747 chapters, 78 volumes
Run	1994–2010 · completed
Community score	AniList 7.6 · MangaUpdates 8.3
Content	Family loss, injury

Overview

Goro Honda grows up idolizing his father, a professional baseball player, and Takuya Mitsuda's Major follows him from that childhood admiration all the way through his own professional career — through Little League, high school, college, and the pros, with real tragedy and setbacks along the way. The manga ran in Shogakukan's Weekly Shōnen Sunday from 1994 to 2010, completing at 78 volumes and winning the Shogakukan Manga Award in 1996.

What it does well

The defining feature here is scope. Very few sports manga commit to actually following a character's entire career the way Major does, and that structure lets Mitsuda build one of the genre's most complete character arcs — Goro isn't frozen at one age or one level of competition, he actually grows up, faces real professional stakes, and changes across decades of in-story time. Tragedy and setbacks get treated as lasting parts of that development rather than obstacles cleared in a single chapter, which is what gives his eventual successes real earned weight instead of hollow triumph.

The baseball itself holds up across every level the story covers, rendered with technical care whether Goro's playing Little League or facing down major-league pitching. That consistency, sustained across a genuinely massive page count, is a real achievement, and it's a big part of why the series is still cited as a landmark of the sports genre decades after it started.

Where it falls short

The obvious barrier is the length — 78 volumes is an enormous ask even by long-runner standards, and it's simply not a realistic commitment for every reader. The early arcs also lean on a fairly conventional sports-manga structure before the series' more distinctive lifelong scope really kicks in, so the payoff for sticking around takes real patience. And given the size of the series, there's no official English release, meaning access depends entirely on fan translations.

Verdict

Major earns its reputation as one of the defining baseball manga by doing something most sports series never attempt: actually following its protagonist's whole career. If you want the genre's most complete character arc and can commit to the length, this is essential. If you want a shorter series or a quick baseball manga fix, this isn't the place to start.