With Manny Ramirez having departed nearly a month ago and weeknight attendances showing noticeable declines, the talk around the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) has been the possible return of former major leaguer Kuo Hung-chih to Taiwan before the end of the season.
At least three clubs have approached Kuo’s agent in an effort to lure the lefty fireballer back home. Kuo, who played several seasons in the majors, despite multiple arm surgeries, would definitely boost flagging interest in the game since Ramirez’s exit, even though the 31-year-old Taiwanese is currently training on his own, having not been claimed by a team in the US.
Previous league regulations meant Kuo could not be declared a free agent until he had fulfilled a nine-year service requirement in Taiwan or a six-year service record in the highest professional league of a different country. The league imposed the restrictions in an effort to prevent players from “hopping from team to team” to boost their contracts.
The league held a meeting of its four team owners and commissioner to amend the six-year service requirement in a foreign league to clear Kuo’s eligibility last month, a ruling known as the “Kuo Clause.”
The sky could now be the limit as far as the terms of any contract for the former Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher are concerned. Even though figures of NT$7 million to NT$8 million (US$234,000 to US$267,500) per year have been floating around, which would easily make Kuo the highest paid player in the league, he has not committed to any offers as he is still more inclined to remain abroad.
“We are continuing our efforts to sign [Kuo] before the end of the season,” Uni-President president Su Tai-an said earlier this week.
His team may be the favorites in the pursuit of Kuo, who comes from Greater Tainan and played his high school ball for Tainan’s Nan Ying Vocational Senior High School before to going to the US in 1999.
Also in hot pursuit of Kuo are the EDA Rhinos, who lost Ramirez last month after experiencing a big upturn in fortunes following the addition of the former major league MVP to their roster.
Regardless of who obtains Kuo’s services if and when he does return home, the team will be expected to give up three draft choices in the ensuing amatuer draft to “compensate” the rest of the league for the signing of such a high profile player, according to the details of the “Kuo Clause.”
Kuo, who was part of the Taiwanese team at the World Baseball Classic earlier this year, signed a one year non-guaranteed deal with the Seattle Mariners in February last year, but was released a month later.
He signed a minor league contract with the Chicago Cubs in June last year, but was released the following month.
Additional reporting by staff writer
The Rakuten Monkeys on Sunday downed the CTBC Brothers 2-1, handing the hosts their second consecutive loss in the best-of-seven CPBL Taiwan Series at the Taipei Dome. Monkeys’ ace starter Pedro Fernandez of the Dominican Republic dominated on the mound, cruising through six scoreless innings before giving up a run on a wild pitch in the bottom of the seventh inning. He gave up only three hits and walked two batters in a 93-pitch outing, giving his Taoyuan-based team an edge. Offensively, the Monkeys’ leadoff batter Lin Li hit Brothers starter Brandon Leibrandt’s pitch over the center-field wall in the game’s first at-bat,
Rafael Leao on Sunday shot AC Milan to the top of Serie A with a brace in a 2-1 win over ACF Fiorentina who were enraged by the “scandalous” awarding of the penalty that decided the game. Portugal winger Leao pushed Milan one point ahead of local rivals Inter, SSC Napoli and AS Roma with a coolly taken spot-kick, given for what looked like a soft foul on Santiago Gimenez by Fabiano Parisi, with four minutes remaining. That goal capped a fine first league start of the season for Leao and came after he drew the hosts level with a brilliantly struck
The tiny village club of Mjallby AIF on Monday won the top tier Swedish soccer league with a 2-0 away win at IFK Gothenburg, sealing the title with three rounds of matches remaining. Jacob Bergstrom and Tom Pettersson scored the goals in Mjallby’s 20th win in 27 league games. Mjallby has a population of fewer than 1,400 people and plays in an outdated 6,000-seat stadium with stands weathered by the winds of the Baltic Sea. “It’s a huge relief to experience this now, a relief with three games to go,” said Anders Torstensson, a former army officer and secondary-school teacher who coaches the
Jahmyr Gibbs was offered oxygen on the bench after a 78-yard run. He turned it down. Clearly, he was not out of breath. Gibbs on Monday scored on a long sprint in the second quarter, a five-yard spinning plunge in the third and accounted for a career-high 218 yards from the scrimmage to lead the Detroit Lions in a 24-9 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. “You felt like this was coming,” Detroit coach Dan Campbell said. “This has been building.” The Lions (5-2) bounced back from a loss as they have done flawlessly for nearly three years, extending their NFL-long streak of 51 games
RSS