Post Merger CPBL and TML
Here's an English web site that might have some useful info regarding pre-merger info: [Link PDF file entitled "Ninja Catchers and Chivalrous Eagles: Taiwan's Baseball and a Globalized Taiwan Identity" by Andrew Morris, Department of History, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo]
Two big lessons learned from this:
- Unlimited foreign players was detrimental to CPBL.
- Fewer teams reduced the dependence on foreign players, and eventually won fans back.
(That was not stated in the above paper, but a first guess to explain fans returning after reducing foreign limits again.)
See also full attendance records for CPBL [CPBL.com.tw - in Chinese].
The first year of the merger, 2003, saw a slight rise in attendance to CPBL from the previous year, but not as large an increase as the previous year, so it's hard to draw any conclusions from that - especially without TML attendance from 2000 on side by side.
CPBL contracted from six to four teams in 2000, but still had a decline in average attendance that first year. Thereafter, though, they started picking up fans. This paper, though, suggests that reducing the number of foreign players will have had a great deal to do with the renewed popularity, as would other marketing factors borrowed from TML. I don't have that data, yet, but at least now I know what to look for.
This also presents a problem when comparing the contraction then merger in Taiwan to Japan: the reasons for declined popularity are very different. In Taiwan, the CPBL lost fans due to over-reliance on foreign players, gambling scandals, and ignoring the local "Taiwanese identity." But with the formation of the TML, attendance to baseball actually increased in 1998 over the last single league season (before the merger) of 1996, suggesting that expansion and separate leagues helped overall.
After reading this paper, though, I wonder - why did the TML fail? They appear to have had everything going for them.
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I've got to do a presentation at this coming Tokyo Chapter SABR meeting. I was going to do something on Yokohama's "benpin dasen," but I think that a study of this Taiwanese merger might be a little more timely. My main problem is, I'm not in any way familiar with what's going on in Taiwan beyond what Kiyoshi-san, Frank, and a few others post here. So this isn't a research project that I can do alone. I'm more used to helping than asking for help, so I hope that I can count on some of you to lend a hand in this effort.
For starters, I'd like to know how well the merger has gone in Taiwan? Is the current CPBL stronger than the former league? Are the two TML teams more profitable under the new league? Has the overall quality of play risen or dropped? I'll expand on these questions once I have a better idea of the situation. (Research should be a dialog, refining questions based on previous responses.)
The Taipei Times has been referenced in a number of CPBL posts, so I'll start researching there. While I can read Kanji, Chinese is a different matter for getting specifics. So any other English language sites (I think Frank runs at least one) covering CPBL would be most welcome.
Note: I am not out to prove a point for or against the merger in Japan. I've dealt with enough "professional" journalist who had an angle they wanted to cover that disagreed with what I believed, and those interviews went very poorly. I believe strongly in the Scientific Method, and will use what data I'm presented with to draw a conclusion, whether I like that conclusion or not. So don't worry about framing an answer to appeal to a particular side of the issue.
Opinion on how well the merger went is welcome, but any facts that can be referenced (attendence, pre/post-merger finances, etc.) would be most welcome.
Thank you all for your help.