Asia Series

Asia Series

Current season, competition or edition: 2013 Asia Series
Formerly	Konami Cup
Sport	Baseball
Inaugural season	2005
No. of teams	6
Countries	Australia (from 2011)  China (2005–2008; 2012)  Europe (from 2013)  Japan  South Korea  Taiwan
Most recent champion(s)	Canberra Cavalry (2013)
Most titles	Canberra Cavalry Chiba Lotte Marines Chunichi Dragons Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters Saitama Seibu Lions Samsung Lions Yomiuri Giants (1 each)
Related competitions	ABL CBL CPBL European Cup (CEB) KBO NPB

The Asia Series is an international club-level baseball tournament in East Asia that was first held in 2005. It features the annual champions of Nippon Professional Baseball, Chinese Professional Baseball League, the Korean Baseball Organization, the Australian Baseball League, and (beginning with the 2013 Asia Series) the European Cup champion,^[1] as well as an additional team from the host city. The China Baseball League, which did not hold any games during 2013, has also historically participated in the tournament.

Background

The Asia Series began as a tournament among the annual champions of Nippon Professional Baseball's (NPB) Japan Series, the Korea Baseball Organization's (KBO) Korean Series, the Chinese Professional Baseball League's (CPBL) Taiwan Series, and the China Baseball League's (CBL) championship series. (Prior to 2008 a China Baseball League all-star team, the China Stars, participated in the series instead of the league champion.) The tournament was sponsored by Konami from 2005 to 2007 and was known as the Konami Cup during that period.

The Asia Series was placed on hold due to financing issues following the withdrawal of Konami, reducing 2009's pan-Asian postseason to a single Club Championship game between the Japanese and Korean champions at Nagasaki, with the Yomiuri Giants defeating the Kia Tigers, 9–4.^[2]

A potential 2010 revival was then cancelled due to a conflict with the 2010 Asian Games^[3] and replaced with another round of club championship games. The Korean champion SK Wyverns split a two-game series with CPBL champion Brother Elephants in Taiwan, before being defeated by the NPB's Chiba Lotte Marines at the Tokyo Dome, 3–0.^[4]

The subject of re-introducing the event for 2011 was discussed in a November 2010 meeting between the heads of the NPB, KBO, CPBL, and Australian Baseball League (ABL). The CPBL offered to host the event in November 2011. The ABL champion Perth Heat participated, with the ABL (whose season runs from November through February) adding a bye week to allow for it.

In 2013, Fortitudo Baseball Bologna of the Italian Baseball League competed as the first representative of Europe to participate in the tournament, qualifying as the 2013 European Cup champions. Due to the CBL's hiatus that year, the tournament remained at six teams.

The 2014 edition was cancelled due to scheduling issues.^[5]

Format

Each of the teams participates in a round-robin series, playing each other team once. The two teams with the best win-loss percentage face each other in the final, with the team finishing higher considered the "home team", meaning that they have the advantage of batting last. In previous tournaments, if teams were tied a series of tiebreakers were used to decide which teams qualified for the final and in what order, firstly using the head-to-head win-loss records amongst tied teams, and if necessary the ranking based on the lowest team run average.^[6] All games have the designated hitter rule in effect, though not all participating teams would have it in their regular league.

Participation

Country	2005	2006	2007	2008	2011	2012	2013	2014
Japan (NPB)								N/A
South Korea (KBO)								N/A
Taiwan (CPBL)								N/A
China (CBL)								N/A
Australia (ABL)								N/A
Europe (EC)								N/A

Finals results

Season	Host Nation		Champions	Score	Runners-up		MVP
2005	Japan		Chiba Lotte Marines	5–3	Samsung Lions		Benny Agbayani (Chiba Lotte Marines)
2006	Japan		Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters	1–0	La New Bears		Yu Darvish (Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters)
2007	Japan		Chunichi Dragons	6–5	SK Wyverns		Hirokazu Ibata (Chunichi Dragons)
2008	Japan		Saitama Seibu Lions	1–0	Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions		Tomoaki Satoh (Saitama Seibu Lions)
2011	Taiwan		Samsung Lions	5–3	Fukuoka Softbank Hawks		Won-Sam Jang (Samsung Lions)
2012	South Korea		Yomiuri Giants	6–3	Lamigo Monkeys		Hayato Sakamoto (Yomiuri Giants)
2013	Taiwan		Canberra Cavalry	14–4	Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions		Jack Murphy (Canberra Cavalry)
2014	N/A		Cancelled due to scheduling issues				N/A

Series records

By country

Country	Champions	Runners-up	Participated	Years Won	Years Finalist
Japan (NPB)	5	1	7	2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2012	2011
South Korea (KBO)	1	2	7	2011	2005, 2007
Australia (ABL)	1	0	3	2013
Taiwan (CPBL)	0	4	7		2006, 2008, 2012, 2013
China (CBL)	0	0	5
Italy (EC)	0	0	1

By club

Club	Champions	Runners-up	Participated	Years Won	Years Finalist	Games Won	Games Lost	Games Pct.
Samsung Lions	1	1	5	2011	2005	9	7	.563
Chiba Lotte Marines	1	0	1	2005		4	0	1.000
Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters	1	0	1	2006		4	0	1.000
Yomiuri Giants	1	0	1	2012		3	0	1.000
Chunichi Dragons	1	0	1	2007		3	1	.750
Saitama Seibu Lions	1	0	1	2008		3	1	.750
Canberra Cavalry	1	0	1	2013		3	1	.750
Lamigo Monkeys1	0	2	2		2006, 2012	4	3	.571
Uni-President 7-Eleven Lions	0	2	4		2008, 2013	6	8	.429
Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks	0	1	1		2011	3	1	.750
SK Wyverns	0	1	2		2007	5	2	.714
Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles	0	0	1			2	1	.667
Lotte Giants	0	0	1			1	1	.500
EDA Rhinos2	0	0	2			1	4	.200
China Stars	0	0	4			0	11	.000
Perth Heat	0	0	2			0	5	.000
Fortitudo Baseball Bologna	0	0	1			0	2	.000
Tianjin Lions	0	0	1			0	3	.000

• ¹: Participated in 2006 under its old name La New Bears
• ²: Participated in 2005 under its old name Sinon Bulls

See also

• Asia Baseball awards
• Asian Baseball Championship
• Caribbean Series
• European Cup (baseball)
• World Baseball Classic
• World Series

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Asia Series.

• Asia Series 2013 Official Website (Chinese (Taiwan))