The Chinese Professional Baseball League is reeling from a series of scandals and feuding over TV contracts that have rocked the sport in recent weeks, resulting in the resignation of the league’s commissioner and disrupting the broadcasting of games.
The in-fighting among the league’s four clubs and perceived mismanagement by officials have many CPBL fans up in arms and withdrawing their support for the league in droves because the games have not been broadcast on cable.
Former CPBL commissioner Hwang Jenn-tai (黃鎮台) resigned on July 25 to take responsibility for the row over the TV broadcasting rights for league games and several other problems, and the post has been vacant since then.
Photo: Lin Cheng-kun, Taipei Times
All the league’s troubles came after the new season started off on a high note, when the league signed a lucrative contract with MP & Silva, an international company specializing in the management and distribution of sport media rights. Under the NT$2.142 billion (US$70.48 million) six-year contract, each club stood to receive NT$89.25 million annually in rights revenue.
At the time of the deal’s signing, MP & Silva representative Cho Su-hyeon said: “We are confident that we can expand the baseball market in Taiwan. Our plan is to promote CPBL games in Japan, South Korea and China.”
However, the partnership went sour as the season progressed, amid questions about the soundness of the deal. Some team owners complained of potential pitfalls, while others contended that MP & Silva was not meeting its financial obligations.
The tension surrounding the deal boiled over on April 30, when several pages of the contract were leaked to Chinese-language weekly Next Magazine, further fueling discontent with the deal.
The fatal blow came on July 19, when MP & Silva announced that it had unilaterally terminated the contract, saying that the CPBL had violated certain terms of the deal and that it therefore had a legal basis on which to end the partnership.
The cancelation of the deal left the league facing a financial shortfall and sparked a wild scramble among rival television networks like FTV, Videoland, Fox Sports and cSKY Sports to secure broadcasting rights for rest of the season’s games.
Further complicating matters was a separate deal cSKY Sports had with MP & Silva.
The scrapping of the contract with the league left the TV channel out in the cold and it is now threatening to sue the CPBL, while the league is contemplating filing a lawsuit against MP & Silva.
After weeks of negotiation, the four league clubs agreed for the first time to go their separate ways on TV broadcasting.
The Uni-President Lions announced this week that they will go with Fox Sports for their home game broadcasts, while the Chinatrust Brothers and EDA Rhinos said they will collaborate with Videoland and the Lamigo Monkeys have yet to announce their decision.
Japanese badminton star Chiharu Shida on Tuesday told Chinese fans to “stop stalking” her, adding that she was “very scared” by the unwanted attention. Shida, who won women’s doubles bronze at the Paris Olympics last year, has a strong following in China partly because of her engagement with the local culture. The 27-year-old, currently competing at the Badminton Asia Championships in Ningbo, China, has been dubbed the “Badminton Goddess” by fans and media. She hit out at some supporters on Tuesday, accusing them in an Instagram post of taking their fandom too far. “Every time we compete in China we always experience the harm
Two people died on Thursday after fans and police clashed outside the Estadio Monumental in Santiago ahead of a game in South America’s Copa Libertadores, Chilean authorities said. The fatalities happened shortly before the match between Chile’s Colo-Colo and Brazilian club Fortaleza, when police blocked about 100 fans when they attempted to enter the stadium. There were conflicting accounts of how the fatalities occurred, with local media reporting that one of the dead was a 13-year-old boy. The other victim was an 18-year-old woman, according to a relative at the hospital where she was treated. The fans died after being caught underneath a
A potential European league could be a gold mine for the NBA as the top-flight North American league looks to muscle its way into a deep pool of talent across the Atlantic Ocean. The NBA is exploring the launch of a European league with world basketball governing body FIBA as a partner, NBA commissioner Adam Silver said last week, with an eye toward a 16-team format made up of 12 permanent clubs and four qualifiers. The continent’s longstanding Euroleague quickly signaled its readiness to enter into talks with the NBA, even as it has balked at the idea of another league in
Hans Niemann, the chess grand master at the heart of an alleged cheating scandal, has yet to provide an explanation on his late withdrawal from the Freestyle Grand Slam in Paris. Niemann, who was accused of cheating by world No. 1 Magnus Carlsen in 2023 before the matter was settled outside court, received a wild card for the event, but informed organizers he was pulling out for “personal reasons” less than 48 hours before the start of the 12-player tournament. “I texted him on Friday at 7pm. I said: ‘Hans, we’re already here. Are you here as well?’ And he read the
RSS