Taiwan Beer
In search of a basketball Googlewhack, I entered "Taiwan NBA" as a Google search. In 2.4 seconds, approximately 250,000 links piled up. For someone wishing to write about an obscure yet interesting topic, these results were astounding and confusing. Why so many links? Perhaps there is a National Bellydancing Association in Taiwan or a No Better Argument Taiwanese debate site?
Clicking like a madwoman, I soon discovered two things:
1) The NBA is wildly popular in Taiwan.
2) I needed a translator.
One phrase stuck out above all others; Taiwan Beer. I know lots of beer slurping NBA watchers in the US; could this be true in Asia as well? Somehow, when I think of Taiwan and basketball, I imagine a culture of polite interaction on the court, followed by periods of jovial team building activities.
And so Chris Wang came into my life. Chris lives in Taiwan and operates two basketball blogs, one in Chinese and, thankfully, one in English. I e-mailed Chris (amazing - he lives in Taiwan, I live in Ohio, we've never met yet we're both on Gmail), asking if he knew the origin of the team name Taiwan Beer.
Chris responded with a wealth of information and agreed to answer more questions:
Q. Do you know the origin of the name Taiwan Beer?
Answer. Taiwan Beer is a basketball team under Taiwan Tobacco & Liquor Corporation (TTL), a former state-owned company which is now private. The tobacco and liquor industry was a monopoly industry in the early days.
The team was established in 1968 with the objective of "promoting sports." Taiwan’s government encouraged state-owned businesses to sponsor sports teams at that time. The name of the team was not Taiwan Beer until 1999 though. [Editor’s note: Forgot to ask Chris original team name]
TTL thought about disbanding the team in 2001 for two reasons:
1) The team cost TTL a lot of money.
2) Taiwanese basketball was going through a down period after a pro league folded in 2000 and the competition level of the amateur league plummeted.
That didn't happen, however. The team started rebuilding itself into a powerful team again. It slowly built up its reputation and recruited talented players. Taiwan Beer is now the most popular team in Taiwan's SBL (Super Basketball League). [Editor's note: According to Wikipedia, the SBL was founded in 2003 and currently features 7 teams]
Q. Are professional athletes in Taiwan (specifically, basketball) paid a living wage? I find the leap from D-League salary to NBA salary somewhat scary in the US.
Answer. The SBL is a semi-pro league. In fact, they are all almost pro players who do nothing but play basketball to get paid. And a large number of players are still college students. Their salary varies (exchange rate to USD around 30:1) from NT 30,000 to NT 150,000 (USD 1,000-5,000). US imports usually get around US 6,000 per month.
Q. Is the NBA popular in Taiwan?
Answer. The NBA is very popular in Taiwan. We have four monthly magazines covering the NBA and extensive NBA coverage on the sports page of daily newspapers. We have four to five games broadcast every week here.
A side note: Basketball is booming in China. But Taiwan and the Philippines are the only two Asian countries which are crazy about basketball but "cold" about soccer. I think that has a lot to do with the U.S. influence, politically.
Q. Politics kept cropping up in my Iran basketball research; the U.S. eventually made the 20 American players leave Iran. Interesting that the Iranian government did not have a problem with these players living and working in their country but the U.S. government wouldn't allow it. I love that the players created a mini-world-of-peace without involving the governments. Once the U.S. government found out, it was squashed like a bug. So sad. Are politics an issue for the teams in Taiwan?
Answer. I heard about the Iran situation. A U.S. basketball coach friend of mine was offered a coaching job with an Iranian club but turned it down in the end because of his U.S. citizenship issue. Unfortunately, that's international politics. We don't have that problem. Basketball is free of political interference here.
Q. You don't have to answer this one but I'm curious about you personally. What is your connection to Taiwan? Born there? Raised there?
Answer. I am a Taiwanese. Born here. Grew up here. Majored in architecture in college but never worked in that field. Worked as an editor for a basketball magazine. Became a sports journalist later, around 8 years in the field. Since 2004, I work in a news agency as a foreign affairs correspondent/English writer who covers foreign affairs, Taiwan-China relations, mostly political stuff.
I'm a voluntary writer for Asia-basket.com's Taiwan section for almost 10 years and host two basketball blogs, one in English and one in Chinese. [Editor's note: yes, I know this was mentioned in the beginning but I do like spreading the blog love whenever possible] Currently, I write weekly basketball columns for a local newspaper and monthly columns for a basketball magazine.
Q. If you could let the world know about Taiwanese basketball, what would you tell them?
Answer. Like the Filipinos, Taiwanese enjoy their style of basketball in a fantastic way. It had its glory days and ups and downs but has been on its uphill climb back to Asia's elite.
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According to a March 24th article in Taiwan News, the first generation of Taiwan Beer basketball players are retiring; here comes the civility I dreamed about earlier in this post:
A first ever jersey retirement ceremony in Taiwan's basketball history was held in Hsinchuang Stadium in Taipei County when two veteran basketball players of local basketball team Taiwan Beer announced their retirement from the court.
The two players are 39 year-old veteran point guard Chou Jung-san, and the 37 year-old legendary three point shooter Lo Hsin-liang.
"It is because of basketball that I have everything I now have," said Chu, expressing great gratitude to his former coaches at every stage of his playing life during the ceremony yesterday.
The ceremony was held during the half time break in yesterday's game between the Taiwan Beer and Pure Youth in the last day of the local semi-professional Super Basketball League regular season game.
"I want to thank all the fans and my family, it is your support that gave me the power to continue to play on the court for more than 20 years," said Lo in the ceremony.
Lo disclosed that he will be a coach after his retirement like Chou, who was already an assistant coach in the Taiwan Beer before he announced his formal retirement yesterday, so that they both can continue to pass down their excellent skills and experience to new generations of basketball players. (Source: Taiwan News)
Thank you, Chris, for opening my eyes to yet another positive basketball experience.
Nice find, Carolyn. As a person of Chinese descent myself, I'd love to see a Chinese player make it to the NBA beyond Yao Ming.
And that's why I wrote this post last year: http://hoopsaddict.com/2007/04/23/sun-yue-prospect-or-suspect/
Posted by: Jeff W | March 31, 2008 at 04:32 PM
They used to be called the Golden Dragons (I think - I'm translating from their old Chinese name, so it could be Gold Dragons or Golden Dragons... dunno).
Posted by: JC | April 17, 2008 at 01:09 AM