Players yesterday protested against field conditions at the Hualien Baseball Stadium for the All-Star Weekend, where the Home Run Derby also took place.
The event was planned as a mid-summer highlight while teams take a break from the season campaign, but the protest by the players’ union overshadowed the weekend’s festivities.
In the Home Run Derby, Yang Yao-hsun of the Lamigo Monkeys hit 26 home runs in the final round to win the contest, beating the challenge from teammate Chu Yu-hsien, who hit 17 pitches out of the ballpark.
In Saturday’s All-Star Game, Chang Cheng-wei from the Brothers Baseball Club delivered with the winning hit in the bottom of the ninth inning, helping the Veteran White Team to win 10-9 over the Rookie Red Team.
However, much of the focus was on the row over what players said were poor maintenance and dangerous field conditions at the stadium.
Many of the All-Star players wore tattoo stickers that said: “This is too dangerous.”
The Taiwan Professional Baseball Players’ Association released a statement criticizing the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) for pushing the All-Star Game at the stadium, which they said was not up to professional standards.
The problems include uneven surfaces throughout the ballpark, irregular dents and cavities in the outfield, patchy grass, poor quality sand and gravel on the infield track, puddles and other issues, the statement said.
“This ballpark does not get the proper care and regular maintenance that it should. These conditions can cause fielders to trip or cause the ball to take a bad bounce. If players are injured, who should be held responsible?” the Brothers’ veteran infielder Peng Cheng-min said.
The Hualien Baseball Stadium is listed as a Category C ballpark, along with ballparks in Hsinchu, Pingtung, Chiayi and Taitung cities, which the CPBL says are suitable for amateur and local baseball training and competitions.
Union officials on Saturday said that they are considering a boycott of any CPBL games or activities at Category C venues because of the poor conditions and lack of regular maintenance, which could lead to injuries and jeopardize players’ careers.
Category B ballparks in Tainan and Taipei’s Tianmu and Sinjhuang stadiums are certified by the CPBL to host regular and exhibition games, as well as major amateur championship tournaments.
Category A ballparks, such as the Taoyuan International Baseball Stadium, Taichung Intercontinental Baseball Stadium, Kaohsiung’s Cheng Ching Lake Stadium and Yunlin County’s Douliou Baseball Stadium, are CPBL-certified for international tournaments, as well as regular and playoff games.
Taiwanese world No. 1 women’s doubles star Hsieh Su-wei on Saturday overcame a first-set loss to win her opening match at the Madrid Open. Top seeds Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium, with whom she last month won her fourth Indian Wells women’s doubles title, bounced back from a rocky first set to beat Asia Muhammad of the US and Aldila Sutjiadi of Indonesia 2-6, 6-4, 10-2. Hsieh and Mertens were next to face Heather Watson of the UK and Xu Yifan of China in the round of 16. Thirty-eight-year-old Hsieh last month reclaimed her world No. 1 spot after her Indian
EYES ON THE PRIZE: Armed with three solid men’s singles shuttlers and doubles Olympic champions, Taiwan aim to make their first Thomas Cup semi-final, Chou Tien-chen said Taiwanese badminton star Tai Tzu-ying yesterday quickly dispatched Malaysia’s Goh Jin Wei in straight sets, while her male counterpart Chou Tien-chen beat Germany’s Kai Schaefer, as Taiwan’s women’s and men’s teams won their Group B opening rounds of the TotalEnergies BWF Thomas and Uber Cup Finals in Chengdu, China. World No. 5 Tai beat Goh 21-19, 22-20 in a speedy 33 minutes, her fourth straight victory over the world No. 24 shuttler since they first faced each other in the quarter-finals of the 2018 Malaysia Open, where Tai went on to win the women’s singles title. Malaysia followed up Tai’s opening victory
Chen Yi-tung (陳奕通) secured a historic Olympic berth on Sunday by winning the senior men’s foil event at the 2024 Asia Oceania Zonal Olympic Fencing Qualifiers in United Arab Emirates. Chen defeated Samuel Elijah of Singapore 15-4 in the final in Dubai to secure the only wild card in the event, making him the first male Olympian fencer from Taiwan in 36 years and only the sixth Taiwanese fencer to ever qualify for the quadrennial event. The last appearance by a Taiwanese male fencer at the Olympics was in 1988, when Wang San-tsai (王三財) and Cheng Ming-hsiang (鄭明祥) competed in Seoul. The
Rafael Nadal on Tuesday lost in straight sets to 31st-ranked Jiri Lehecka in the fourth round at the Madrid Open, while Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei advanced to the semi-finals in the women’s doubles. Nadal said that he was feeling good about his progress following his latest injury layoff. Nadal called it a “positive week” in every way and said his body held up well. “I was able to play four matches, a couple of tough matches,” Nadal said. “So very positive, winning three matches, playing four matches at the high level of tennis. I enjoyed a lot playing at home. I leave here with