Konami Cup:
The K Cup kicks off tomorrow. Opening games will match up the CBA All-Stars and the President Lions; & the SK Wyverns against the Chunichi Dragons. 2007 Taiwan Series MVP Nelson Figueroa is expected to start against the Chinese All-Stars. Figgy's teammates Wei-Lun Pan and Pete Munro are expected to match up against the Dragons and Wyverns respectively.
Here's a shocker: more disparaging remarks about Taiwanese baseball from the Korean media. It's obvious the Korea Times isn't giving much respect to the CPBL and the President Lions. With headlines like "Wyverns, Dragons Clash for Bragging Rights", and a comparison of the CPBL to the CBA:
"The Wyverns and Dragons are considered a level above Taiwan's Uni-President Lions and China's China Stars, which means that the winner of today's opener would be a good bet to win it all."
you would think that the President Lions have no chance in the K Cup.
Two things are a given in this tourney: the Chunichi Dragons are the tourney favorite while the CBA All-Stars will be hard-pressed to win one game. Contrary to the general concensus in Korea, the President Lions will be extremely competitive in this competition. This year's CPBL representative has more overall talent and depth than the 2006 La New Bears. Also when you look at the brief history of the K Cup, the games between the KBO and CPBL champs have been decided by one run both times. In 2005, the Sinon Bulls lost 4-3 to the Samsung Lions. In 2006, the La New Bears defeated the Samsung Lions 3-2. If anything, the two games have proven how similar the talent level is in Korea and Taiwan.
I hope Lions Manager Lu pins this crap on the team bulletin board to help get the team fired up for Saturday's game.
14 comments:
Hopefully the CPBL champs will let the scoreboard do ALL the talking.
Dang Koreans are talking a lot of smack lately.
Ironically this comes at a time when Korea is declining and Taiwan rising.
is Taiwan rising right now? in what way? do you mean economically? I thought Korea has been rising economically these past few years and Taiwan's economy has been consistent. They are talking alot of smack though with the NT "gotta beat Taiwan at all costs" and now this. All because they lost to Taiwan at DOHA. They are in general very nationalistic. Sometimes its scary how much nationalistic fervor they have. Kinda like how almost all Koreans drive Hyundais and get mad at other Koreans when they drive Japanese cars.
Taiwan's rising in baseball. Hu's emergence and YC Chen's potential, and HS Choi, Jae Seo, and Park all fading.
I admire Korea's nationalism. Dang I wish Taiwan had 3/4 of that.
dont forget Byung Hyung Kim though. But, yeah.... I wish we had half the patriotism that Korea had. seriously though, Korea is getting to the point of being blindly nationalistic though- which leads to disrespectful comments such as the NT coach one and this one were talkin about now. Oh yeah, and also the time that Taiwan sent a youth team ( i think they were around 12) to Korea to compete in a baseball tourny. They mopped up at the tourny and almost made it to the finals until the guys in charge decided that they couldnt keep competing because they had a very good chance of winning. 1st place was reserved for a Korean team. see how much absolute BS that is.
heres a youtube link of the youth team being sent home by the tourny organizers or whatever. its in chinese
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxN7TXU754Y
heres another article on the youth team in korea thing
http://www.occidentalism.org/?p=326
pride in your country is good but being blindly nationalistic is not.
wow, the Chinese all star team has improved some. They managed to rack up 12 hits and 4 earned runs off of Nelson Figueroa in 7 innings. The Lions won today 9-4 but were down 4-1 until a monster top of the 7th when they scored 6 of their 9 runs. both teams ended the game with 14 hits. Im guessing the Chinese team improved a good bit since last year. Or maybe Figueroa wasnt in his groove. who knows? NEXT UP - Lions vs Dragons - this will be good.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that 7 out of 9 runs we scored were due to home runs. Chen Lien Hung hit a grand slam in the 7th followed by Yang Sens solo shot in the 7th and then another 2 run sot Chen Lien Hung in the 9th!
The Korean youth team fiasco was a disgrace, but let's fix our gambling first
KBO is a level above CPBL, otherwise better players wouldn't jump from CPBL to KBO then NPB.
Not to mention, most of the games played by CPBL are fixed because of gambling problems.
what player jumped from the CPBL to the KBO?
Kenny "George" Rayborn of the SK Wyverns played for La New last year. Competition may have been a factor in Kenny relocating to SK, but the bottom line is that the KBO has deeper pockets than the CPBL. Hence, star players will always look for greener pastures whether it be in SK, Japan, or the US.
I think the root cause of the KBO grater cash lies in the lack of Fortune-500 businesses in Taiwan.
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