When Taiwan won their first major title in a senior-level international baseball tournament by capturing the Premier12 championship in November last year, it was the highlight of the CPBL off-season, but in terms of the impact on the league’s future, the emergence of a genuine free-agent market last month might eventually matter more.
All four players who declared for free agency at the end of last season — Chen Tzu-hao, Chen Yun-wen, Chan Tzu-hsien and Chu Yu-hsien — signed new deals for at least four years and annual salaries of nearly NT$10 million (US$305,979) at a minimum.
Though only a few players were involved, it was the league’s most active and lucrative free-agent market ever.
Photo: CNA
Previously, only two contracts of five years and three contracts averaging more than NT$9 million a year had been signed in the CPBL since the start of the free-agency era in 2009.
To many, the four sizeable free-agent contracts marked a potentially momentous turning point for the CPBL, one as big as the birth of free agency in Major League Baseball in 1976.
Videoland broadcaster Jacky Lee shared his insights on the factors driving the big contracts and the significance of the active free-agency market in an interview with the Central News Agency.
The most direct cause of the more generous contracts was increased revenue from ticket sales last year, Lee said, a trend he attributed to the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, the use of the Taipei Dome and the rising popularity of cheerleaders.
Last year was the league’s first complete season since the Central Epidemic Command Center disbanded on May 1, 2023, after a 1,197-day COVID-19 pandemic response.
The end of the pandemic and access to the Taipei Dome, which opened in late 2023 with a seating capacity of up to 40,000, helped lift average attendance at CPBL games by 28 percent to 7,684 last year.
Overall, the CPBL drew a record 2.77 million fans across 360 games, eclipsing the previous record of 1.8 million in 2023.
Lee attributed some of that rising attendance and growing revenues to the decision by the Lamigo Monkeys (now the Rakuten Monkeys) in 2011 to introduce cheerleaders at CPBL games.
“There is no denying that the cheerleaders have significantly boosted the sport’s exposure and attracted more fans to the stadiums, resulting in a merchandise sales increase,” Lee said. “Now when people see cheerleaders, even at non-baseball commercial events, they think about baseball.”
The big spending this off-season also coincided with higher quality players being available.
That was due in part to the CPBL allowing high-school graduates to be directly drafted in 2013, enabling players to still be relatively young after completing the nine years of service required to declare for free agency.
“Chen Tzu-hao is the most successful high-school pick so far. He has power and is just 29 years old, unlike older free agents already in decline,” Lee said.
A standout with the CTBC Brothers, Chen Tzu-hao signed a 10-year, NT$130 million contract with the Wei Chuan Dragons, the longest and biggest deal in CPBL history. It also included franchise and player options, a rarity in the league’s 35-year history.
Chen Yun-wen, 29, another player drafted into the league directly from high school, has the most saves of any pitcher in CPBL history. He stayed with the Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions on a five-year, NT$45 million contract.
The other free agents were Chan, a 30-year-old outfielder who stayed with the Brothers, and Chu, a 33-year-old outfielder who signed with the Dragons.
“The stronger and younger these players are, the more bargaining power they have,” said Lee, who hoped that the nine-year free-agency period could be shortened so that more players could hit free agency in their primes.
Another factor fueling the off-season buzz has been the league’s expansion, Lee said.
For the first time in more than 15 years, the CPBL featured six teams last season, after having contracted to four following a major gambling scandal in 2008.
It stayed that way until the Wei Chuan Dragons rejoined the league in 2020, and went back to six teams with the addition of the Taichung-based Hawks last year.
The four-team league stifled the free-agent market because players had few options, giving employers the upper hand in contract negotiations.
“If the Dragons and Hawks had not joined, I believe the free agent market would not have been this eventful,” Lee said.
The Hawks’ strong interest in signing Chan forced the Brothers to give him a five-year contract worth at least NT$48 million, even though he played 12 fewer games last year than in 2023 and logged lower numbers.
With players like Chen Tzu-hao landing record-breaking deals, Lee said players would be more willing to test the free-agent market or force teams to reward players to keep them away from free agency.
On Friday last week, about one month after Chen Tzu-hao’s deal, the Brothers and their five-time Golden Glove Award-winning shortstop Chiang Kun-yu agreed to a 10-year, NT$147.9 million deal.
Chiang, a 2018 third-round pick by the Brothers as a high-school graduate, is just 24.
“[Signing players to big contracts] is an ongoing trend. It would not surprise me if the CPBL sees more deals like this in the future,” Brothers general manager Liu Zhi-wei said.
The CPBL does not have a salary cap, meaning its players can earn as much as their franchises are willing to pay, but the high contracts do not mean the organizations lose.
Instead, competition over players only keeps interest in the league alive after the season has ended, Lee said.
“We’re witnessing the dawn of the CPBL’s best era, and it can get even better,” he said.
SIBLING RIVALRY: Marc Marquez was locked in a duel with his little brother, falling behind at one point before recovering for his first season-opening victory since 2014 Six-time world champion Marc Marquez yesterday won the MotoGP season-opening Thailand Grand Prix to complete a dominant debut weekend at his new Ducati Lenovo Team, having also romped to Saturday’s sprint. The Spanish great took the 26-lap grand prix by 1.732 seconds for his 63rd MotoGP victory from younger brother Alex Marquez, who is still seeking a first checkered flag, with Francesco Bagnaia third to complete an all-Ducati podium. It completed a perfect weekend for Marc Marquez, who took pole position, the sprint victory and the grand prix win for a maximum 37 points to open the 22-leg 2025 campaign. He led from
Team Taiwan avoided missing the World Baseball Classic (WBC) for the first time by defeating Spain 6-3 in a do-or-die game in Taipei last night. After narrowly escaping a mercy-rule loss to Spain in the WBC Qualifiers opener on Friday last week, the home team — winner of last year's WBSC Premier12 title three months ago — got their revenge against the 2023 European champions at Taipei Dome. "It felt quite different from when we won the Premier12," Taiwan captain Chen Chieh-hsien (陳傑憲) said after the game, recalling the ups and downs the team has experienced over the past few days. Unlike in
LONG TIME COMING: With the addition of Marcus Smart, the Washington Wizards finally held a team to under 100 points, the last team this season to do so The Detroit Pistons on Monday won their seventh straight game in the NBA with in-form Cade Cunningham making 32 points and grabbing nine rebounds in a 106-97 win over the Los Angeles Clippers. The Pistons, who are in the playoff position, moved to 32-26, their best record at this stage of a season for 17 years. It was an all-round effort from Detroit with Tobias Harris adding 20 points and Jalen Duren making 19 rebounds along with his 12 points. It was a tight contest until Detroit pulled away late in the third quarter to tie their longest winning streak since the 2014-2015
AC Milan’s slender hopes of reaching next season’s UEFA Champions League took another hit on Thursday with a 2-1 defeat at Bologna which left them eight points from Serie A’s top four. Sergio Conceicao’s team sit eighth, some way behind fourth-placed Juventus after losing an entertaining contest at the Stadio Renato Dall’Ara, a match which was rescheduled from October last year due to torrential rain and flooding. Swathes of the Emilia-Romagna region in northern Italy, much of which is fertile agricultural land, had been left under water following a massive autumn downpour. Dan Ndoye prodded home the decisive goal in the 82nd minute
RSS