A player on the Athletes in Action team — an evangelical organization representing the US — in this year’s Jones Cup basketball tournament was recently quoted as saying that his team was playing for an “Audience of One,” a reference to the Christian God. It is possible, however, to take this reference more literally, because the dreadful crowd turnout at the Jones Cup this time around has not been much higher.
It is not difficult to establish why the crowds have stayed away. It is an invitational competition and does not necessarily attract the strongest or most celebrated national sides — some of which are not genuine national line-ups anyway. It also receives live coverage on cable TV, which keeps away potential spectators who balk at traveling to Sinjhuang in Taipei County.
But most of all, it would appear, local crowds are not interested in watching a competition in which the local team struggles to be competitive and wins one out of nine games.
Taiwanese are notoriously fickle sports fans, suggesting that “fans” might be the wrong word. All too frequently, a lack of genuine passion for sports and teams manifests itself in abandoning struggling national sides that would otherwise play much better with a sizeable home crowd.
The frustrating thing in the case of basketball is that it is supposed to be a sport in which Taiwan excels. It has a professional league, garners large amounts of print space and broadcast coverage and is reasonably adept at promoting senior players to the level of celebrity.
The reality, however, is that allowing for all of the resources being thrown at the sport and all of the self-congratulation at the domestic level, the standard of basketball here is diabolical.
The first problem is that so few attached to the sport seem to recognize this, despite contest after contest of listless international performances.
The second problem is that even if basketball authorities did acknowledge their sport’s pallid appearance, the attitude of smugness and elevated sense of achievement that defines too many of the players may well defeat any chance of reform.
“Attitude” is an appropriate word to use here, because it is also the name of a documentary produced to trumpet the Taiwan Beer basketball team that opened in three — count them, three — theaters in Taipei on Friday and a smattering of screens in other cities.
As the Taipei Times review of the film said yesterday, the film — and the team, for that matter — is hard to take seriously if you take into account the Beermen’s petulant withdrawal from a competition last year because of an isolated violent incident suffered against a Chinese side.
There is tremendous enthusiasm for basketball at the grassroots level, but the system is falling apart in the transition from domestic celebrity to international duty.
We have discussed at length the reasons for Taiwanese sporting teams’ difficulties in performing well internationally — a lack of credible patriotic symbols, Chinese meddling and so on — but for once it can be said in regard to this sport that Taiwanese audiences, players and administrators only have themselves to blame.
The next generation of players deserves better.
China has not been a top-tier issue for much of the second Trump administration. Instead, Trump has focused considerable energy on Ukraine, Israel, Iran, and defending America’s borders. At home, Trump has been busy passing an overhaul to America’s tax system, deporting unlawful immigrants, and targeting his political enemies. More recently, he has been consumed by the fallout of a political scandal involving his past relationship with a disgraced sex offender. When the administration has focused on China, there has not been a consistent throughline in its approach or its public statements. This lack of overarching narrative likely reflects a combination
Behind the gloating, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) must be letting out a big sigh of relief. Its powerful party machine saved the day, but it took that much effort just to survive a challenge mounted by a humble group of active citizens, and in areas where the KMT is historically strong. On the other hand, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) must now realize how toxic a brand it has become to many voters. The campaigners’ amateurism is what made them feel valid and authentic, but when the DPP belatedly inserted itself into the campaign, it did more harm than good. The
For nearly eight decades, Taiwan has provided a home for, and shielded and nurtured, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT). After losing the Chinese Civil War in 1949, the KMT fled to Taiwan, bringing with it hundreds of thousands of soldiers, along with people who would go on to become public servants and educators. The party settled and prospered in Taiwan, and it developed and governed the nation. Taiwan gave the party a second chance. It was Taiwanese who rebuilt order from the ruins of war, through their own sweat and tears. It was Taiwanese who joined forces with democratic activists
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) held a news conference to celebrate his party’s success in surviving Saturday’s mass recall vote, shortly after the final results were confirmed. While the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) would have much preferred a different result, it was not a defeat for the DPP in the same sense that it was a victory for the KMT: Only KMT legislators were facing recalls. That alone should have given Chu cause to reflect, acknowledge any fault, or perhaps even consider apologizing to his party and the nation. However, based on his speech, Chu showed
RSS