Comedy is a wonderful genre that can be the main genre of anime, but it can also be a complementary genre to every other genre out there – and still be just as good. However, comedy and sports are two genres that you don’t really see together too often.
Many sports anime fans come to watch the intense competitive sports action if not for the emotional character stories that are so prevalent in the sports genre. They may enjoy the occasional joke, but that's not what draws them to sports anime.
However, if you enjoy sports anime and can appreciate the genre sometimes not taking itself too seriously, then these great sports comedies anime recommendations are for you.
Sports comedy anime
Haikyuu
Yes, if you're a sports anime fan, you're probably sick of seeing Haikyuu on EVERY. SINGLE. LIST. of sports anime. However, that doesn't mean it doesn't belong here.
Part of what makes Haikyuu such a huge success is its powerful combination of high-energy sports action that has paid off big time when it comes to animation budgets. However, a big part of Haikyuu's lovability also comes from the fact that it lets its unique cast of characters be silly and often makes them silly.
Some people like this volleyball anime because of the spotlight it puts on volleyball. Some people like Haikyuu because of the BL set up that makes fans fall in love with their fanfics. And some people like Haikyuu because it makes them laugh as much as they cry. All of these things have contributed to the show's genre-breaking success.
Yowamushi Pedal
Like Haikyuu, Yowamushi Pedal is a popular sports anime that can attribute some of its success to the extent to which it injects comedy into its sports story.
In fact, since Yowamushi Pedal is about cycling, a sport that's even less appealing to many anime viewers than volleyball, a big part of that success probably comes from the fact that many of the show's characters have delightfully silly, eccentric, or crazy personalities while cycling, often creating natural jokes based on their own prominent personalities.
Teekyuu
While Haikyuu and Yowamushi Pedal are more sports action than comedy focused on gags, Teekyuu is the complete opposite.
Over the course of 9 seasons (short-form, 2-minute episodes), you'll be hard-pressed to see this deranged girls' tennis club actually play tennis more than a handful of times. It gives you a bunch of jokes that hit harder than you'd expect while being wrapped in that sellable moe art style.
Teekyuu is definitely for those who enjoy a more upbeat style of comedy as it delivers explosive jokes at you at top speed. However, it is a lot of fun and there is a lot to enjoy.
If you run out of Teekyuu, they also have a spin-off anime about a rival tennis team called Usakame that's pretty much the same thing. more Teekyuu, but with different girls.
Bamboo Blade
Bamboo Blade masquerades as a standard sports anime about a kendo club and appeals to people because there are few anime about traditional Japanese combat sports. However, what you get is not a serious sports anime.
Instead, you get a comedy about a group of girls convinced to practice kendo by a broke coach who tries to win free meals for a year by defeating his senpai's really capable opposing kendo team.
Where this show really shines as a comedy is in its characters. The show takes pretty standard character archetypes and then simply combines them to create a unique cast of characters with flaws that you wouldn't traditionally see in those stereotypical characters.
You've seen plenty of “smart” girls join a team, but Bamboo Club makes this goofy girl actually goofy in a cute way. You've seen adorable klutzes act as the heart of the team, but Bamboo Blade makes her the unexpected mission leader.
This character is what makes this sports anime, not that it takes its plot seriously, worth watching.
Go! Ina Junior High Table Tennis Club
Ina Junior High Table Tennis Club is an old comedy anime about a sports club. As the title suggests, it follows the members of a table tennis club where most of the members are comically degenerate outcasts who are not popular with the girls.
Similar to Teekyuu, Ina High School Table Tennis Club is about the boys in the table tennis club who don't play the sport very often, if at all. Instead, they make fart jokes and engage in various depraved situations that always leave them as unpopular virgins.
While ecchi comedies aren’t for everyone, this series is very much a “boy” comedy aimed at young men. Think something like Prison School or The Daily Lives of High School Boys.
Forgotten battery
As Japan's favorite sport, anime tends to treat baseball with a different set of gloves. Baseball anime, if not serious, is about brash young baseball players aiming for Koshien.
While serious sports anime can have a lot of lightness to them, you usually turn to baseball anime if you want serious sports action or at least some thoughtful baseball-themed slice-of-life drama. However, Oblivion Battery breaks the mold.
Oblivion Battery presents itself as a serious baseball anime about a team of geniuses who are torn apart after the catcher loses his memory and stops playing. The series explores that serious-sounding plot as well, but it surprisingly cuts between jokes about nipple hair and the main character, so much so that even when he's playing ball, he's hilariously whining about how much he doesn't want to play ball.
While Oblivion Battery is a rehabilitation story, it's one that only pauses for entertainment by showing some fun baseball moments animated by Mappa. The sports gags are great and the cast of characters are very likable, this is a sports comedy anime for people who love comedy but also want a little bit of sports in it.
Clean Aoyama-kun
Clean Freak Aoyama-kun bills itself as a sports anime about a genius soccer player who also has a comical obsession with cleaning. However, it quickly drops most of the soccer-related reasons.
I see, Clean Freak Aoyama-kun is a lot like Haven't You Heard? I'm Sakamoto. Both series are about the pinnacle of human perfection as the main character, but in Clean Freak Aoyama-kun, he has a humorous flaw in needing to see things clean. While there are certainly messier sports than soccer, I think you can guess the focus of most of the jokes in the series based on its premise.
While the series has fewer soccer scenes than some sports anime fans might like, it incorporates many typical sports tropes into its plot and turns them into jokes. It also gets increasingly epic with its jokes, which makes up for some of its failures on the sports front.
LadySpo
Sometimes, you just have to look at underrated anime to get an idea of what's going on. Ladyspo is a series that has an impressive 3.06 rating on MyAnimeList, a site where anything with a 6 or lower is considered trash by the general public. However, the question of what happened to LadySpo immediately becomes clear. The series is a drama that's being marketed as an anime. A drama that has voice actors acting out a story in front of static images with no animation.
So when that question is settled, LadySpo is still a sports comedy, it may not be an anime.
The series in question is about professional sports bounty hunters fighting each other in various sporting events in hilarious, ridiculous ways. Since the episodes are also about 4 minutes long, there really isn't much to say about it. It's not great, but it's a good way to waste time.
Grand Blue
Grand Blue, in my opinion, is hardly a sports anime. Partly because it focuses more on comedy, but also probably because I don't know if scuba diving is considered more of a hobby or an actual sport.
However, it's also the same. Space is a sports anime and Grand Blue is known for its adorable degenerate comedy, so I'll let potential viewers make the final judgment.
Grand Blue follows a new college student who is quickly drawn into a college diving club run by his classmate's uncle and cousin's dive shop. There, he finds what can best be described as normal college students—a group of young men and women who prefer drinking and goofing off to studying and being responsible. It's their drunken shenanigans that provide many of the running gags throughout the series as Grand Blue does everything in his power to keep these characters from getting into the water.
It's just temporary anyway.
Grand Blue is big on jokes and wacky adventures, but it takes its dive moments very seriously. It even goes so far as to seem to develop an actual plot, even as it quickly undercuts any dramatic or touching moment with a joke.
Umisho High School Nude Swimming Club
Yeah, that's a very questionable title club.
While Umisho High School's Naked Swimming Club starts out very much like one of those “normal kid joins a club full of weirdos” comedies, it does get some ecchi with the surprise appearance of a girl from Okinawa joining the club whose special habit is swimming naked.
However, like a good ecchi anime, the nudity is meant to be a joke rather than an actual titillation. However, ecchi comedy isn't everyone's idea of comedy, and Umisho High School's Naked Swim Club is indeed an ecchi comedy.
Still, this is a sports anime about a swimming club. The main character wants to learn how to swim and this new naked weirdo teaches him and is a pretty good swimmer himself.
Softenni
Softenni is an anime about cute girls doing cute sports activities that are cute in every sense of the word. However, cute girls being cute doesn't always mean comedy. However, Softenni has made an extra effort to not only make its characters moe enough for the market, but also comedically flawed enough to add a sense of comedic enjoyment.
Even though they only play actual soft tennis a few times throughout the series, you'll be endeared to the characters' endearing flaws that often create humorous situations and conversations the characters engage in.
Kinnikuman/Ultimate Muscle
Kinnikuman is considered a precursor to the shounen genre, but at its core it's a sports anime. As both a superhero parody and a pro wrestling sports anime, Kinnikuman introduced us to the shounen action formula that would be refined into what we see today.
We have big, energetic battles, but also some really deep and great humor about its meat-headed characters. Just like a shounen anime, you'll see this start out as the silliest comedy about an evil superhero who discovers he's actually an alien prince and see it slowly turn into a more serious action sports anime over the long run.
Do you have any sports anime with comedy worth mentioning? Let fans know in the comments below.