Editing Baseball in Taiwan (section)

== Professional baseball ==
'''Professional baseball in [[Taiwan]]''' started with the founding of the [[Chinese Professional Baseball League]] (CPBL) in 1989. At its 1997 peak, Taiwan had two leagues and 11 professional teams. The competing [[Taiwan Major League]] ran from 1997 until its absorption by the CPBL in 2003.

The professional game has had several [[Match fixing|game-fixing]] [[scandal]]s which had led to sharp declines in game attendance. However, as of 2016 baseball in Taiwan had begun to see a renewed interest in the sport in spite of this setback due to major cheating scandals.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Jennings |first1=Ralph |title=Baseball was nearly dead in Taiwan after a major cheating scandal. Here's how it made a comeback. |url=https://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-taiwan-baseball-snap-story.html |newspaper=LA Times |date=18 October 2016 |access-date=21 September 2021}}</ref>

=== Chinese Professional Baseball League ===
{{main|Chinese Professional Baseball League}}
The '''Chinese Professional Baseball League''' was founded in 1989 with four teams and grew to seven. As of 2009, however, there were just four teams competing for the championship of the [[Taiwan Series]].

Since 2005, the winner of the [[Taiwan Series]] represents Taiwan in the [[Asia Series]], competing with the championship teams of [[Japan]] and [[South Korea]], and with [[China]]'s professional leagues.

=== Taiwan Major League ===
{{main|Taiwan Major League}}
The '''Taiwan Major League''' was founded in 1997 by the chairman of [[TVBS]], a popular cable TV channel company, after it lost the nine-year (1997 to 2006) broadcasting rights for CPBL games to [[Videoland Television Network]]. TVBS had held the broadcasting rights from 1993 to 1996.

The TML was meant to compete with the CPBL, but after 6 years of financial losses, it merged with the CPBL in 2003.