Japanese baseball fans jump into river as 'Curse of the Colonel' is broken

Many baseball fans in Osaka celebrated wildly by jumping into a dirty river in the city center and kept the party going late into the night after the Hanshin Tigers won the Japan Series, which has only happened twice in their history.

The Tigers, Japan's much-loved baseball team, won the championship for the first time since 1985 by defeating the Orix Buffaloes in the final game of a seven-game series. This victory ended the "Curse of the Colonel," a superstition that said the Tigers would never win again after fans threw a plastic statue of Colonel Sanders into the river the last time they won. One devoted fan, Yuko Kawase, who attends many games each season, said it felt like a dream. She reflected on the 38 years since their last win and remembered fans she knew who have passed away. Despite police warnings about the…