After 12 years as a professional baseball team, the Chinatrust Whales walked into the pages of history yesterday. Team president Luo Lien-fu, captain and general manager Lin Min-cheng, along with the team’s legal advisers, held a press conference at the headquarters of the China Professional Baseball League (CPBL) at 4pm yesterday to announce that the Whales have been disbanded.
The main reason for the team’s demise is persistent rumors of players’ involvement in gambling.
In 2003, Su Li-wei was implicated, followed this year by five other players — Tseng Han-chou, Chi Chun-lin, Huang Kui-yu, Cheng Chang-ming and Chen Chien-wei.
When the scandal hit league rivals dmedia T-Rex after alleged collusion with underground syndicates in game fixing was uncovered last month, resulting in their expulsion from the CPBL, the Whales also came under suspicion.
The CPBL has experienced game-fixing incidents in six of the past seven years.
Recent investigations by the Whales’ management indicated that there were strong grounds for suspecting that its players were involved in fixing games.
Considering this situation, the Whales’ management yesterday decided to withdraw from the CPBL and disband the team.
Following this latest bombshell, next season the CPBL will go back to having just four member teams, as it did 20 years ago.
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