When I think of pro baseball, I think of greedy, over-bloated steroid users. I also think of the sleepy Braves games at Turner field were there is more entertainment off the field than on it. Sure, the mega stadium experience that is MLB baseball has it’s drawing points, but the main factor, the game, has been lost to me. I haven't seriously followed baseball in years, which is a shame because baseball is the sport that I first paid attention to as a child. Where I was a big fan and followed my favorites, that was lost over the years as the sport seemed to lose it's way in my eyes.
So you can imagine how odd it was to see a Korean Pro baseball game for the first time. I had was not sure what to expect but I decided to keep an open mind. This isn't the U.S., it's another place and they hold baseball in a different reguard than Americans do. In fact, the Korean National Team was runner up in the World Baseball Classic last year. I was very curious about how Pro baseball here in Korea measured up.
I was invited by the P.E. teacher at my school (one on the right in the picture below) to watch the local team play. The Samsung Lions, from what I’ve read about, are a traditional powerhouse in the K-League (KBO). However, it seems as if things have shifted a bit and they are on a slight slump. Still competitive, but not as dominat as before. Still, I jumped at the chance to do something different. So after school one day, we headed to the stadium.
The very first thing I noticed was that we parked almost right next to the stadium. Back home you would be hard pressed to find a parking spot close to a High School football field let alone a Pro baseball stadium. We walked over and bought tickets (which were dirt cheap) and my friend went to buy food.
Now here’s the kicker. He went across the street to the convince store. He actually bought outside food to the game. This would be blasphemy at any professional sport. You could sneak a rocket launcher into a purse faster than you could sneak in a pack of M&M’s to a Braves game. Yet I noticed people bringing bags of food and even picnic baskets into the stadium. I also noticed a large cluster of ajumas (old women) selling fried chicken outside. They were yelling at anyone walking past and would go so far as to run up and try to pull a person over to their stand. It was hilarious seeing about 7 old ladies run up to random people yelling at one time trying to get them to buy something.
To make things more interesting; I noticed that the choices for food inside and outside the park are NOTHING LIKE THE STATES. Back home, it’s all about “Peanuts and cracker jacks”, Hot Dogs, cokes, chips and everything in between. Here in Korea - Not a hot dog in site. Most people were chowing down on fried chicken or woofing down cups of ramen. The P.E. teacher and I ended up eating dried squid. It's like a really chewy, rubbery dried chicken meat. Not a favorite, but not bad either. The one thing that doesn’t change is that people drink beer during the game. It seems that alcohol is the universal substance of consumption at sporting events.
When we went inside, my friend the P.E. teacher asked me where I wanted to sit. Yep, that’s right. You can pick your seats. We walked around and found a spot between the upper level and the lower one, just to the left of home plate and right on top of the dugout. As the stadium filled up, I noticed people would sit almost anywhere. The spots on behind the last row were wide concrete isles, so people got cardboard and sat on the grown behind the seats and formed another row.
I thought it was great. Very odd to me, but I liked the idea. You get to the park early, you get a good seat. I found this very strange considering that movie theatres here assign seats. I wonder if it’s just for Daegu or is that universal. 
The stadium is noticeably smaller than a MLP park. From what I've read, it only seats about 12,000. It is also an older stadium. But it also means there really isn’t a bad seat in the house. You can clearly see the field and I was glad to be able to do that.
Now as the game started, I noticed one glaring thing. This guy in a uniform started stretching on top of the dugout and these girls dressed similar to the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders showed up. Confusing? Yep. It turns out that the guy in the uniform is a designated cheerleader in the most literal sense of the word. This guy actually leads the crowd in cheers. He’s got a microphone piped into the sound system and he gets the crowd to root on the players. And this goes on the entire game. Between at bats, there are special cheers and chants much like soccer chants that go on. The girls accompanying him even hold up place cards with the words to the chants. This made things really easy to get into.
As for the girls, well, they are actual cheerleaders. They do dances and cheers to music, they help get the crowd into the game. . . and they are there to look pretty. They remind me of the dancers at an NBA game who do routines during time outs. They even do costume changes.
Overall, I liked this idea. Because the crowd is literally chanting every players name at each at-bat, they are always into the game. The focus is on the players and the game. However, this was done without the belligerent drunkenness that one might see at a college football game back home or other sporting events. There’s no way I would want to take a kid to many pro sports games (especially football) but I would have no issues with one going to a Korean baseball game.
I also liked the feel of being into the game for once. I’m sure it helps the crowd feel like they are more apart of what is going on. I know I felt more into the game than I ever did at a sporting event back home (save for HBCU football games. . . . nothing beats a black college homecoming). I got into the chants and tried my hardest to sing along (they are all in Korean so I tried to read the cards as best I could). I was walking up and down the isle chanting and waving a team towel. I even wound up on the jumbo-tron a few times. (Note to self: Large black man chanting in Korean is easily as entertaining to Koreans as it sounds. )
The only thing I didn’t like about the chants was that they were more about Samsung than the city. Unlike in the states, the pro teams aren’t known by the cities they are based in. They are known by the sponsors. So you wouldn’t say the Daegu Lions. . . you would saythe Samsung Lions because Samsung owns them. It’s on the jerseys and it’s in the chants. I find it so odd considering that in America, the teams are usually big parts of the cities they are in. So much so that teams take on the personalities of their cities (The Pittsburgh Steelers are a great example. You have a blue collar town with a workmen, middle class, rough around the edges mentality identity that the team emulated in their style of play. The Steelers are a tough Defensive with a hard hat style offense.). It just felt odd to say that I was watching a game between the Samsung Lions and the KIA Tigers. Still, it wasn't like they cross-marketed things to death. The stadium isn't named Samsun Stadium and the company logo isn't quite plastered all over the place. Just the team name.
Sadly, the team lost the game. I found out that the KIA Tigers are the league leaders and it was obvious why. Their team must have hit four homeruns before the game was done. Also, the Lions loaded the bases three times and hardly capitalized on it. There were a lot of runners left on base during the game. Still, I had a great time. I even caught one of the little prize bags the cheerleaders shot into the crowd. I ended up with gift certificates to Lotteria (Aka Fake MacDonald’s). I could see myself going to a lot of games especially if I decide to do a third and final year here. It was a fun experience and it made me like baseball again.
No "Take Me Out To The Ball Game" or Seventh Inning Stretch. I was hoping to hear a Korean version of that song so I was a little dissapointed.
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