High-school infielder Cheng Tsung-che has signed a contract with the Pittsburgh Pirates that includes a signing bonus of US$380,000.
Cheng, who attends Pu Men Senior High School in Kaohsiung, is the first player from the school to pursue his baseball dream abroad and the 10th Taiwanese player to sign with the Pirates organization.
Accompanied by his parents, the 17-year-old signed the contract after completing a physical.
Photo: Flight International via CNA
Cheng thanked his parents, the team and its scouts, and his management company, along with coaches and friends.
“Thank you for helping me to become who I am now. I won’t stop working hard in the future,” he said, expressing his hope of reaching the Major Leagues one day and promoting Taiwan to fans around the world.
Cheng, who has been praised for his speed and defensive skills, has mostly played shortstop in high school.
He has been named Best Shortstop at the junior amateur level in Taiwan, received the Best Batter Award at last year’s Nike All-Taiwan Baseball Camp and was named to the best nine-man team as shortstop at the Fubon under-18 Future Star Game.
Cheng was also selected for Taiwan’s national team, playing in this year’s World Baseball Softball Confederation under-18 Baseball World Cup. He is to train with the team in Matsuyama, Japan, from July 25 to Aug. 1.
“After coming back to Taiwan, I will return to the team as quickly as possible to win the World Cup with my teammates,” Cheng said of the tournament, which is to be held in South Korea from Aug. 30 to Sept. 8.
“It is a dream come true to play professional baseball in the United States,” Cheng added. “I look forward to competing and learning with players from all over the world.”
Cheng will be hoping to make more of a mark in the Major Leagues than other Taiwanese signed by the Pirates, as only Wang Wei-chung made it up from the minors, and he did it with a different team.
“The Pirates have shown the most initiative during the signing process,” Cheng said. “They told me the organization would do their best to develop me as a player.”
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