Here at Recommend Me Anime, we don’t do manga series in our recommendations, just anime. However, that doesn’t mean that anime fans don’t also like to lie in bed and read a few good chapters of manga every now and then.
And besides, where do many good anime series come from in the first place – The pages of manga.
If you want to read some good sports manga, and want to be someone who can potentially say you enjoyed a good series before it was all cool and animated, then check out these great sports manga recommendations that don’t have anime adaptations – yet.
Best Sports Manga With No Anime
Real
Tomomi Nomiya was once the captain of his basketball team, but after ruining a girl’s life in a traffic accident, he turned into a delinquent. He drops out of high school in order to help her where he meets a former sprinter in a wheelchair named Kiyoharu.
Kiyoharu challenges him to a game of basketball and completely crushes Tomomi, an encounter that inspires him to not let go of his love for basketball so easily.
Subaru
Instead of playing and making friends like a normal girl, Subaru spends most of her time with her dying twin brother who is gradually losing his memory.
In order to make him remember her, she talks and dances for him. Eventually, one of her few friends encourages her to join ballet classes that makes her fall in love with dancing.
Good-For-Nothing Blues
Maeda is a new student at Teiken High School. While is clumsy and stutters when he is nervous, he makes waves immediately at the entrance ceremony by hitting a teacher.
While this outburst has club scrambling to recruit him to be their muscle, Maeda is a loner who only has one dream – to become a boxing champion.
As such, his only first objective is to beat the boxing club captain.
Crimson Hero
Nobara Sumiyoshi is a volleyball player and has ambitions to make it to the big time. However, she just can’t seem to have any good luck in the highly competitive world of high school volleyball.
The Climber
Transferring to a new school, Mori is rather solitary by nature. In an attempt at bullying, some classmates convince him to scale the school building, which he does.
After an exhilaration climb, he has awakened a new passion in life – the sport of rock climbing.
Harlem Beat
Nate Torres is a baller with big dreams. However, after failing to make his school’s basketball team, he doesn’t let his passion for basketball die.
Instead, he takes it to the one place there is left for it – the streets.
Rikudou
After his father’s death, a former-boxer-now-Yakuza taught Riku how to throw a punch. Later, when his mother’s drug dealer tried to assault him, he used a punch that ended up taking the man’s life.
Now marked as a killer, he evades even more trouble. This leads him back to that same former boxer in search of more skill to defend himself and eventually enter the world of professional boxing.
Rookies
Kawato is the new Japanese teacher and baseball coach at Futagotamaga High School, a place with a reputation for delinquency. Even the baseball team was been barred from professional competition for a year after causing a brawl.
While the suspension on the team has been lifted, the only members still on the baseball team are only interested in women and leisure. However, Kawato inspires them with a new goal of reaching the Koushien, but these out-of-shape players have a long road ahead of them.
Teppuu
Ishidou Natsuo is good at every sport she tries, and as such, she is constantly bored by the lack of challenge. However, one day she is invited by a chipper girl to join her martial arts club.
Annoyed by her, she accepts on the pretext to beat her up, but things don’t go exactly as planned. It turns out that this may be one sport that can best Natsuo’s natural talent.
All Rounder Meguru
Meguru and Takashi are two childhood friends that haven’t seen each other in years, but are reunited at a mixed martial arts contest.
While Meguru only does MMA for the fun of it, Takashi has professional dreams in the realm of MMA. Although they have different reasons for fighting, they are united by their love of mixed martial arts.
Rough
Although Keisuke Yamato and Ninomiya Ami both share a love of swimming, they come from two rival confectionery shop-owning families.
While their families fight about who crafted an owl-shaped cake first, Keisuke shows promise as a freestyle swimmer and Ami is an excellent young diver.
RRR
Although Rikitaro has rockstar dreams, those dreams are becoming less and less likely as he gets older. In one final shot, he is told he needs to get in better shape to sell albums.
This leads him to a boxing gym where he catches the eye of a retired boxer who believes that he can make Rikitaro into a legendary fighter.
Smash!
Shouta and Miwa share a love of badminton. Miwa tries to convince Shouta to go to the same badminton school as her, as she is also in love with him, but Shouta, dense as ever, says he just plays for fun.
Yet, his outlook on badminton changes drastically after a fateful encounter with a mute girl.
Our Field of Dreams
Takasugi Kazuya is the son of a Japan League soccer player. He has dreams of some day playing in the league with his father. This dream of soccer stardom takes him all over the world as he aims for the top.
King Golf
In Teirin High School, you are either a thug or an elite sports player. Sousuke Youki is a thug known for his fighting skills.
One day, after being ignored by a prodigy golf player, he follows him and ends up being recruited by the thuggish golf coach to play.
More Manga Recommendations
There are literally thousands of more sports manga series out there that haven’t been animated yet. Do you have any more manga recommendations? Let sports manga fans know in the comments section below.
