It is said that people in their 20s turn away from baseball, but there are also young people who love it. They constantly attend baseball games, analyze games, and enjoy baseball, just like other fans.

“Channel PNU” met with Park Se-Hoon (Dept. of Industrial Engineering, 23), Yang Seung-Hyun (Dept. of English Language & Literature, 19), Yoo Seok-Ju (Dept. of Chinese Language & Literature, 18), Jeon Hyun-Jung (Dept. of History, 23), and Choi Lin (School of Mechanical Engineering, 19), who are all the members of “No Hit No Run,” a central club of Pusan National University (PNU), where they watch baseball together, in the “Channel PNU” conference room on May 11th. They talked about how they were into baseball and their thoughts on baseball.

Q. What made you a baseball fan? 

A. Park Se-Hoon: I fell in love with baseball when the Samsung Lions (Samsung) won the Korean Series in 2011. My friends around me are criticizing me because I am a Samsung fan, although I am from Busan. When I first started watching baseball, I didn't know the home team concept, and the Busan people liked the Lotte Giants (Lotte).

A. Yang Seung-Hyun: In actuality, I just started watching baseball. Since 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic began, I had nothing to do at home, so I started watching baseball. At that time, Lotte won five consecutive games right after the opening, and many Lotte fans said, "This year is different." I became interested in baseball then and have been watching it so far.

A. Yoo Seok-Joo: When I was in elementary school in 2008, I went to the baseball stadium for the first time with my father. I was from Daegu, and he was a fan of Samsung, so I naturally became a fan of Samsung. When I saw a player hit a grand slam, I felt thrilled and became a baseball fan.

A. Jeon Hyun-Jung: I became interested in Lotte after watching Lotte's official YouTube. I can't remember the particular reason why I watched baseball, but Lotte made me a fan like fate, regardless of their record. I came down from Samcheok, Gangwon Province, to Busan because I liked Lotte.

A. Choi Lin: I am from Iksan, Jeollabuk-do. Since the Honam area is the home of the Kia Tigers (Kia), I became a fan of Kia. I first saw the Korean series in 2009, and Kia won the championship. Since then, I have been into baseball and am still rooting for Kia.

Q. Some say the twenties turn away from baseball. What do you think the reason is?

A. Yoo Seok-Joo: I think the long game time makes it difficult for people who are not fans to enter baseball. The game time is usually three hours. It is okay for people who have watched a lot of baseball from the past, but it is frankly difficult for people who do not know baseball to watch the game for three hours. This seems to be the reason why baseball is shunned in a rapidly changing world.

A. Choi Lin: In the past, Korean baseball had a good record in international competitions. In 2008, it won the Olympic Games and WBC (World Baseball Classic). Recently, the results of international competitions have been terrible, so people in their 20s are leaving. On the other hand, in the case of soccer, it is popular because it has recently reached the round of 16 at the World Cup. If it has good results, fans increase naturally.

Q. On the contrary, what would attract the twenties to baseball?

A. Park Se-Hoon: All players should play more aggressively and enthusiastically. When I watch a game, I get angry with some players who walk without running hard. The appearance of a player who is not passionate, even though the team is losing, makes the fans less willing to visit again. Even if they lose, there should be a lot of players who play hard until the end.

A. Yoo Seok-Joo: Fans who do not watch baseball should be convinced to watch it. A good performance by a local team or a team that they can cheer will help attract them. There is also a saying that the best fan service is performance.

It is also important to think about how to attract fans who visit the ballpark for the first time to revisit. If the experience of visiting the baseball stadium for the first time remains positive, they will revisit it again.

Q. What is the charm of baseball that you do not feel in other sports?

A. Yang Seung-Hyun: Baseball is more dramatic than other sports. The attack and defense are clear, and when the batter enters the batter's box, the batter and the pitcher have their own time. Especially, I think that the feeling that I can feel as a fan when the batter hits a walk-off in a dramatic situation that determines the game, like at the bottom of the 9th with the bases loaded with two outs, is a pleasure that cannot be felt in other sports.

A. Jeon Hyun-Jung: Baseball's long game time can be a problem for the influx, but I like the slow tempo of the game. Because of the many variables, the games can end in two hours, and sometimes it takes four hours. It's also a charm of baseball that you never know when it will end. It's also delightful for all the fans to come together during the long game and sing a cheer for the player at bat.

Q. Experts cite players' deviations as one of the factors that make baseball less popular.

A. Yang Seung-Hyun: Shin Tae-Yong, the former national soccer manager, once said, “Baseball is leisure.” This means that baseball players are free in terms of weight loss and physical fitness compared to other sports, even though they are athletes. Some say that baseball players lack work ethics, and frankly, baseball players tend to be lax compared to other sports.

A. Yoo Seok-Joo: If the cheering player causes social controversy, it is enough to turn me off. Some people around me did not watch baseball for a while due to the deviation of the baseball players. The decrease in the flow of new fans as the overall perception of baseball worsens due to deviations will not be negligible.

Q. As a baseball fan, how do you rate this year’s WBC?

A. Park Se-Hoon: Baseball is a sport played with a ball. In the case of short-term competition such as the WBC, variables are inevitable, and there can be games that are lost. This is a problem caused by less experience of young players. I think it's a pain for a generational change.

A. Jeon Hyun-Jung: I was disappointed as a Korean fan, but as a Lotte fan, I was satisfied that Lotte players did well. In this WBC, I was disappointed with the overall player appointment and the choice of coach and manager when changing pitchers. If a manager like Larry Sutton (current Lotte manager) had taken over as the manager, it would have achieved good results.

A. Choi Lin: The manager of the WBC national team was Lee Kang-Chul, who has little experience in international games. As he is not a professional manager, it is a big problem that he did not have enough time to grasp the players and had less time to work in harmony. In addition, while the salary of the players continues to rise, that of the coaches does not make much difference. As a result, the professionalism of the WBC coaches has declined as the percentage of retired players becoming coaches has decreased.

Q. What is the effort required by KBO to promote baseball's popularity?

A. Yang Seung-Hyun: JTBC's entertainment programs, such as “The Strongest Baseball,” seem to be an opportunity to get interested in high school baseball and independent baseball, which may be unfamiliar. If people become interested in amateur and independent baseball through these entertainment programs, Korean baseball will achieve good results like “Koshien,” Japanese high school baseball. It can naturally lead to KBO's success.

A. Yoo Seok-Joo: Times have changed now. The higher the number of views of articles and videos, the greater the impact is. The clubs and KBO need to make greater efforts for releasing interesting content. To attract a lot of fans, it should show various content by ultilizing YouTube or SNS of each team that can attract fans. It is time to do a lot of self-PR, not just good baseball performance.

Reporter Im Hyeon-Gyu

Translated by Kwon Eun-Ji