I haven't read the manga so I can't tell for sure, but my wild guess would be that we won't get away without at least some emo moments where Mihashi will end up doing something wrong and getting embarrassed before the crowd (and the "I'm no good..." usual speech should ensue). About the mood of the first episode:
I liked what I saw in the first episode - interesting characters, decent animation which shows nothing special but I couldn't spot badly drawn people. Great OP. Nothing amazing, really, it just looks like it'll be a fun ride. I hope A1 Pictures's first production can do well, it's always nice to see new studios not making awful-looking series.
I'm a bit doubtful about its possible success, since sports anime isn't exactly the most popular things amongst otaku, and not many other people will be watching this so late at night. But maybe the BL fangirls will be there to maintain the budget? It looks like there are a lot of doujins floating around, so I suppose they make up for a good part of the fans
