March 11 (Bloomberg) -- A statue of Kentucky Fried Chicken Corp. founder Colonel Sanders was recovered from an Osaka river 24 years after being thrown there by fans of a pennant-winning local baseball team, the Yomiuri newspaper reported.

The statue was found yesterday in the Dotonbori, which runs through the southern part of downtown Osaka, by a worker who was cleaning the riverbed, the newspaper reported, without naming the worker.

A likeness of Colonel Sanders was thrown into the river in 1985, when the Hanshin Tigers won professional baseball’s Japan Series for the first time.

Supporters chose the store-front statue because of its resemblance to Randy Bass, an American hitter for the Tigers at the time, and the team’s inability to repeat the win since has given rise to what fans call “the curse of Colonel Sanders,” the report said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Masatsugu Horie in Osaka at mhorie3@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: March 10, 2009 22:00 EDT