The LA Dodgers arrived in Taiwan last night geared up for a game against a Taiwan All-Star team today in Taipei.
Dodgers Manager Joe Torre confirmed yesterday the starter for today’s game at the Tianmu Baseball Stadium would be Eric Stults. The starter for tomorrow’s game will be Josh Towers and Taiwanese pitcher Kuo Hong-chih (郭泓志) will start Sunday’s game.
For Taiwan, left-hander Lin Ying-chieh (林英傑) of the Sinon Bulls will start today’s game. Lin’s teammate, right-hander Yang Chieh-fu (陽建福), will be the starting pitcher tomorrow.
PHOTO: CHANG CHIA-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
About 3,000 tickets for today’s game are still available and will be on sale at the turnstiles.
The organizer hosted a press conference last night to welcome the Dodgers which was attended by Sports Affairs Council Minister Tai Hsia-ling (戴遐齡), Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), Kaohsiung County Commissioner Yang Chiu-hsing (楊秋興) and other dignitaries.
Paul Archey, vice president of the international division of Major League Baseball (MLB), said Taiwan has a long tradition of relations with the “Big League.”
The Dodgers first visited Taiwan in 1993 and lost two out of their three games to the local team.
“We will not let that happen again. That’s a guarantee,” Archey said.
The same promise was made by Gene Orza, chief operating officer of the MLB’s Baseball Players Association. He also promised baseball fans are going to see the “the highest level of talent.”
“I am sure the players are in for a fight in the next three days,” Orza said.
Lu Wen-sheng (呂文生), manager of Taiwan’s All-Star Team, said he was so excited about playing against a Major League team that he probably wouldn’t get any sleep last night. When asked about the chances of his team beating their illustrious opponents, Lu was rather modest and said all the players were sure to do their best and try not to lose by too great a margin.
Torre said he first encountered Taiwanese baseball when a Taiwanese team won the Little League World Series. As former coach of the New York Yankees he also coached Taiwanese pitcher Wang Chien-ming (王建民), who helped the team secure 19 wins two seasons in a row, in 2006 and 2007.
Aside from Kuo, the Dodgers’ Taiwanese infielder Hu Chin-lung (胡金龍) will also play in the games.
“The fact that we have two Taiwanese players plays a big part,” Torre said, when asked about the decision to play in Taiwan, adding that he was curious to see how popular Wang and Kuo actually are here. Torre said he was impressed by the way Taiwanese players competed and how determined they were.
Meanwhile, Hau welcomed the Dodgers and said the Taipei City Government would offer an NT$20,000 bonus to any local player who hits a home run during the tour.
The Dodgers will play two games against a local professional All-Star team today and tomorrow in Taipei.
“We are giving out monetary rewards to encourage our players to perform well in the two games,” Hau said yesterday at Taipei City Hall.
The city government has devoted a lot of effort and resources into getting the Dodgers to visit Taipei in a bid to boost the city’s image, he said. It has spent more than NT$3 million (US$94,400) to improve the facilities at the stadium and will provide 30 free shuttle buses to transport fans to the two games.
Hau will open one of the games and join a group of elementary school students in singing the national anthem at the opening ceremony today.
Hau said the city government expected the games to rekindle the passion of local baseball fans following the recent game-fixing scandals.
Fang Yang-ning (方仰寧), director of Taipei City’s Traffic Police Division, said the division would dispatch about 100 officers to exercise flexible traffic controls around the stadium on Tianmu E. Rd, Fukuo Road, Tongshan Road, Zhongcheng Road and Zhongshan N Road today and tomorrow.
Shihdong Road will be closed to traffic from 9pm today and tomorrow to allow 30 shuttle buses to take fans to Zhishan MRT Station.
Fang encouraged the public to use public transport to get to the stadium to avoid traffic congestion.
An Emirates flight from Dubai arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport yesterday afternoon, the first service of the airline since the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran on Saturday. Flight EK366 took off from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at 3:51am yesterday and landed at 4:02pm before taxiing to the airport’s D6 gate at Terminal 2 at 4:08pm, data from the airport and FlightAware, a global flight tracking site, showed. Of the 501 passengers on the flight, 275 were Taiwanese, including 96 group tour travelers, the data showed. Tourism Administration Deputy Director-General Huang He-ting (黃荷婷) greeted Taiwanese passengers at the airport and
POSSIBILITIES EMERGE: With Taiwan’s victory and Japan’s narrow win over Australia, Taiwan now have a chance to advance if South Korea also beat the Aussies Taiwan has high hopes that the national baseball team would advance to the World Baseball Classic (WBC) quarter-finals after clinching a crucial 5-4 victory over South Korea in a nail-biting extra-inning game at the Tokyo Dome yesterday. Boosted by three home runs — two solo shots by Yu Chang (張育成) and Cheng Tsung-che (鄭宗哲) and a two-run homer by Stuart Fairchild — the triumph gave Taiwan a much-needed second victory in the five-team Pool C, where only the top two finishers would advance to the knockout stage in Miami, Florida. Entering extra innings with the game tied at four apiece, Taiwan scored
MISSION OF PEACE: The foreign minister urged Beijing to respect Taiwan’s existence as an independent nation, and work together to ensure peace and stability in the region Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) yesterday rejected Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi’s (王毅) comments about Taiwan, criticizing China as a “troublemaker” in the international community and a disruptor of cross-strait peace. Speaking at a news conference on the sidelines of the Chinese National People’s Congress, Wang said that Taiwan has always been a territory of China and that it would be impossible for it to become its own country. The “return” of Taiwan to China was the natural outcome of the Chinese people’s resistance against Japan in World War II, and that any pursuit of independence was “doomed
One person was killed and another seven injured today when a tourist shuttle bus plunged 30m to 40m down a ravine in Nantou County, the Tourism Administration said. The bus is suspected to have suddenly accelerated out of control near the flower center of the Sun-Link-Sea Forest Recreation Area, a popular attraction during cherry blossom season. Of the eight onboard, a 66-year-old man was killed, four were seriously injured and three sustained minor injuries, including the driver. The Nantou County Police Department said it received a report of the incident at 12:15pm and dispatched seven teams to assist. All surviving passengers have been transferred
RSS