They Like Baseball Here

Hey look at that, it's two sports related blog posts in a row. Don't like sports? So sue me. I made it to a baseball game three weeks ago actually, I'm playing catch up with old pictures and material.

Baseball is very popular in Korea. Actually, last year Korea competed in the World Baseball Classic and got second place. They lost to Japan, but beat the U.S.A. In Korea there are 8 baseball teams in a country of a little over 40 million people. I guess we can compare that to the US which has 30 baseball teams in a country of over 300 million people. Actually one team is in Canada, but whatever.

They baseball game I saw took place in Seoul, at a stadium located on a subway stop called "Seoul Sports Complex." I think that a few teams use the stadium, so there aren't really any markings of affiliation on the stadium that show which team plays there.

The game we saw featured the Doosan Bears vs. the Samsung Lions. It was technically a home game for the Bears, but it seemed like there were about the same number of fans for both teams.

Below is what the stadium looked like, a baseball diamond in Korea looks pretty similar to what they do in America:

There is one (very) important difference at Korean baseball games. At these stadiums, people are allowed to bring in any food or beverage. Yes, beer can be brought into the game and enjoyed instead of paying $7 for one in the States. Amazing! I forgot to mention before, but I went with a few people from my city. In the picture below is Steven, Jackie, then Michael and Jake are enjoying the chicken. My friends Kayla, Crystal, Brian, and Renzo are there as well but unfortunately I didn't take any pictures of them.

The game was fun to watch, but it's surely a different experience from an American baseball game. It feels a lot faster in Korea. In the US it's a leisurely pace, each player is announced and slowly walks up to the batter's box. In Korea I couldn't really keep track of each player going up because there wasn't any announcer.

So it definitely felt faster here, but the game we saw was ridiculous. They couldn't get anybody out. The first inning ended at like 4 to 4 and lasted about 45 minutes. It was kind of like watching batting practice, or a little league game. After the first inning they started getting people out more quickly, but they game still lasted a long time. We had to leave early in order to catch the bus, so I can't tell you the final score.

One great thing about Korea baseball, though, is that the crowd is so enthusiastic about the game. There are cheers going on pretty much all the time, and people have those stupid thundersticks, too, so it gets pretty loud. There are cheerleaders, as well, so that's definitely nice.

Here's a banner I like that was talking about voting day or something, but it covered up and blocked the view of an entire section of people:

Well, I definitely had a blast and hope to go to a game again soon.