Baseball in Taiwan
Baseball is one of the most popular sports in Taiwan; indeed, to call it the national sport would not be an exaggeration, judging from its popularity. The performance of the national team in international competitions directly affects the prosperity of grassroots baseball. However, in recent international competitions, the performance of the Chinese Taipei national baseball team has not been satisfactory, and to date, the professional baseball team, which represents the highest level in the nation in the sport, has not won the Asia Series championship, which represents the highest level of Asian baseball, leaving a large gap in people’s expectations. Also, around the international competitions, the “Chinese Taipei” is the name for the Republic of China (ROC), commonly known as Taiwan, designated in the Nagoya Resolution whereby the ROC and the People's Republic of China recognize each other when it comes to the activities of the International Olympic Committee. The ROC participates under this name in various international organizations and events, including the Olympics and Paralympics, Asian Games and Asian Para Games, Universiade, FIFA World Cup, Miss Universe, Overwatch World Cup 2017 and the World Health Organization (Chinese Taipei, 2017).
To revitalize the sport, the former Sports Commission of the Executive Yuan (currently the Sports Department of the Ministry of Education) proposed the “General scheme of baseball sport revitalization” in 2010-2014 (Executive Yuan, 2010) under the close watch of the President and the Executive Yuan, with the high expectations of the entire nation. The scheme advanced a comprehensive training system for the bottom-up development of the sport tailored to Taiwan’s baseball because only after grassroots efforts are promoted and implemented can the training of baseball talent and competitive strength be fostered to lay a solid foundation for reviving the “baseball kingdom”. Lin, Tung, Chen, and Chen (2011) have used decision-making science and the scientific concept of performance assessment to construct a model for the screening and training of pitchers for the Chinese Taipei national baseball team while investigating the performance of the players to provide effective implications and correct rankings for the Chinese Taipei Baseball Association (CTBA) and the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL), which serve as the task force of the Chinese Taipei national baseball team. Thus, the present study investigates whether the actual competition performance of the professional baseball teams in regular season games, the playoffs, and mega events has met the expectations of baseball fans and has been recognized. Only by implementing scientific management to elevate the competition performance and the overall future development of baseball is there some positive meaning.