Nearly
10 years ago, Taiwanese pitcher Chin-hui Tsao was considered a top 25
baseball prospect. He had a powerful fastball and was deemed a future
ace. In his first professional season in the United States in 2000, a
19-year-old Tsao struck out 187 batters in 145 innings. By 2003, Tsao
was pitching for the Colorado Rockies.
But
several arm and shoulder injuries derailed his career, and in 2009 he
returned to Taiwan to play in the Chinese Professional Baseball League
(CPBL). He has not pitched in the U.S. since.
Last
week, reports surfaced that the Los Angeles Dodgers were close to
signing Tsao, now 33, to a minor league contract—a transaction that
would hardly be notable if not for the fact that Tsao hasn't pitched
professionally since that 2009 season in Taiwan, a result of having been
named in a match-fixing scandal in his home country. Tsao was banned
for life from the CPBL despite a Taiwanese court having acquitted him of
any charges.
Although
he was not convicted, the acquittal papers alleged that Tsao had
conspired to fix two games; one of which never occurred because of a
rain-out and the second of which was allegedly not fixed after several
players backed out. Still, the accusations were enough to kill Tsao's
career in his home country.
作為第一個在大聯盟出賽的台灣人，家喻戶曉的曹錦輝代表了中華職棒對抗假球的零容忍政策的一個象徵。
The
first player from Taiwan to appear in the major leagues, Tsao—who
received a still-record $2.2 million signing bonus in 1999—has become a
symbol for the CPBL's new, tough stance on game-fixing.
The
CPBL so believed that Tsao's ban was necessary to maintain the
integrity of Taiwanese professional baseball that last month the league
pressured the Australian Baseball League to nullify Tsao's contract
agreement with the Adelaide Bite, where Tsao had hoped to showcase
himself to major league teams.
Why
would the CPBL take such a hard stance against a prominent player?
Quite simply because game-fixing has threatened baseball in Taiwan for
nearly 20 years.
Baseball
has been Taiwan's most popular sport for more than a century. Japanese
occupation of the island brought the sport to Taiwan in the late 19th
century. Baseball thrived despite a lack of support from the Chinese
nationalist party after World War II. By the late 1960s, baseball had
become a source of pride for Taiwan, which, under pressure from China,
had lost its United Nations seat.
當
台灣在國際社會面對各種尷尬的政治問題時，該國少棒隊的精彩表現讓全世界用不同的方式認識了台灣。台灣少棒於1969至1981年豪奪10次由美國舉辦的
世界少棒大賽（Little League World Series）冠軍，並迫使該賽事的組織者於1975年開始禁止國際球隊參賽。
So
while Taiwan faced political international ambiguity, the country's
youth baseball teams helped establish an identity for the island.
Taiwanese youth teams won 10 of 13 Little League World Series
titles from 1969-81. Tournament organizers banned foreign teams from the
1975 Little League World Series in large part because of Taiwan's
dominance.
On
October 23, 1989, several businessmen agreed to found the CPBL with
four teams backed by Taiwanese companies: Wei Chuan Corp., Uni-President
Enterprises Corp., Mercuries & Associates, and Brother Hotel, Inc.
Attendance was nearly 5,000 fans per game in that inaugural 1990 season.
The league expanded to six teams in 1993, and then added a seventh team
in 1997.
But
the China Times Eagles were soon disbanded after the first major
game-fixing scandal in 1997. Several investigations revealed that
players from the Eagles, the Mercuries Tigers, and the Wei Chuan Dragons
had participated in game-fixing after having been physically
threatended by gangsters. At one point, gangsters even stabbed Wei
Chuan's manager, Hsu Sheng-ming, a Taiwanese baseball legend, after he
refused to participate in game-fixing.
Similar
scandals arose in 2005 and then again in 2008, which resulted in the
disbanding of several other teams and a complete reorganization of the
league. But not even that could prevent the 2009 scandal involving Tsao
and his Brother Elephants team—the country's most popular player and
most popular franchise. Taiwan was not past its corruption problems, and
previously attempted solutions had proven to only be cosmetic.
"Instead
of going after some of the source problems—organized crime and dirty
politicians—they quickly cut loose all the players brought up on
allegations, whether they are guilty or not," said one Taiwanese
baseball insider who did not want to be identified because of the
sensitive nature of the topic. No source who spoke to VICE Sports for
this story wanted their name used.
The
CPBL is susceptible to match fixing for several reasons: first, the
Asian gambling market is a billion dollar industry and it infects all
countries in the region in some way.
Second,
Taiwanese players are among the lowest paid in professional
baseball. "The league just doesn't respect the player," said one scout
based in Taiwan. "The league is just not professional."
Players
earn a base salary of just over $2,000 per month, which is not
guaranteed. A player, despite having a multi-year contract, can be
released at any time. There is also no true free agency and no real
minor league system. Some teams make players stay at high school dorms
during spring training, and many players are obligated to perform
clubhouse attendant duties.
It
is also worth considering the socio-economic backgrounds of some of the
players. As a result of baseball's popularity in the 1970s, Taiwanese
schools began to offer the sport almost as a vocational class. Young
Taiwanese kids essentially began to focus on baseball rather than on
academics.
Players
spent more time training than they did in the classroom, and schools
recruited players from afar to improve their baseball teams to
participate in ultra-competitive leagues.
"It
becomes baseball training for most of the high schools," said the
Taiwanese baseball insider. "Even though it's school, academics are not
part of their education."
Schools
began to recruit players from some of Taiwan's most impoverished
neighborhoods. Aboriginal Taiwanese—like Tsao—who had grown up without
much of an education, and had been some of the country's most
marginalized citizens, were particular targets. As a result, a large
chunk of the CPBL player pool became comprised of aboriginal Taiwanese.
All
of this helped create an environment where players became willing
participants in game-fixing because they needed money to supplement
their low salaries, or because they had grown up in an environment of
economic survival where crime was not necessarily seen as an illicit
activity, or they simply lacked the education to make better decisions.
"With
game-fixing problems, the players' social background and value system
and what type of character development they received are things that
need to be considered," the Taiwanese baseball insider said. "When they
don't get character development as part of their education, and they
begin to have values that are more about money, how do you overcome
these pressures as adults to make the right judgments?"
Game-fixing
followed a similar path, according to sources. A former teammate or a
friend would introduce players to gangsters. This usually happened
during a social outing where players were treated to drinks and, often,
sexual favors. Once in contact with the gangsters, these players were
soon asked to fix games, sometimes forcefully. Some gangsters were
powerful enough where they could directly call into the clubhouse to
check on their investment.
The
league has tried to combat this criminal element by forcing players to
attend anti-gambling seminars during spring training. Players are also
made to sign consent forms that allow league officials to monitor their
cell phones.
"People
I've talked to still think it's probably going on in some form," said
one American League team scout. "There hasn't been a high profile bust
like when Tsao was indicted, but the gangster/mafia culture is so
prominent in the country it's tough to root it out of baseball."
這也就是為什麼中華職棒認為曹錦輝的例子是如此的重要。
And that's why the CPBL believes Tsao's case has become so important.
In
June 2010, shortly after he had been banned in Taiwan, Tsao worked out
for several major league team scouts in the U.S. He did well enough in
those tryouts to attract some interest.
But
MLB was hesitant to approve any deal until a full investigation had
been conducted. In order to fully vet Tsao, MLB deployed its
investigative unit—the same group that had been put together to untangle
PED use, and had also helped curb illegal activities in the signing of
Latin American amateur players. After a lengthy investigation, Tsao,
according to several sources, was cleared to sign with a major league
team.
This
has been Tsao's biggest claim to innocence. But Tsao remained unsigned
until now. It was only after Tsao's workout for MLB team scouts in
November 2014 that interest in him arose again. During that tryout in
front of about 15 teams, Tsao threw 92-93 mph and appeared in good
shape. Yet that was only good enough to get him a minor league deal.
"At
the end of the day, he's had so many injuries and some of the baggage
he brings was just not worth the risk," said one National League team
scout, who said he had been impressed with Tsao's workout. "If we would
have signed Tsao, it would have created some commotion."
他接下來又說道：“我認為他是清白的，但是這些事情總是有許多灰色地帶的，不是嗎？”
He added: "As far as I know, I think he's innocent. But there's a lot of gray area out there."
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