I've been writing about baseball in China since I first arrived here in
1998. My first story can be found in chapter five.
Over the years I added some small bits about baseball in these pages. You
can find some of them here and
here. Since then, baseball has become an important
part of my life in China. It's about time I devoted some chapters to
baseball in China.
The Baseball Chapters of
Chuck@China continue.
By the time 2004-2005 rolled around, some of the
players were entering their third season and their last year of school. In
fact, a couple had graduated in the summer of 2004. Now you have to
understand something, Zhejiang University is in the top 5 universities,
academically, in China. Most of the students are the best-of-the-best. It is
known primarily as a science, math and engineering school, but offers more
than 100 majors.
The guys on the baseball team had been devoting
a lot of time to baseball, in addition to their studies. Yet, they were
still doing well in their studies. One of the graduating team members was
accepted in a graduate program at the University of Arizona. No, not for
baseball, but for bio-medical engineering. (Another of my students - not on
the baseball team, alas- is now studying at Cambridge.) ZJU really has
excellent students.
Here's a complete listing of the 2005 Baseball
team's Majors:
Software Engineering (3)
Mechanical Engineering And Automation
Computer Science And Technology (4)
Environmental Science
Electronic Information Engineering
Zhukezhen College* (3)
Civil Engineering (2)
Geology
Mathematics And Applied Mathematics (2)
Electronic Science And Technology
Public Health
Business Administration
Land Resources Management
Biomedical Engineering
*Zhukezhen College is a special college within
Zhejiang University.
It is ZJU's Honors College. The best of the best students of ZJU
from all majors are specially selected for the Honors College.
Three team members are Honor College students while still
participating in the Baseball team. Note the absence of English majors.
So we had this team of academic over-achievers
who had had little chance to achieve anything in the field of baseball,
despite 2+ years of dedication. The university had given them just a little
support. The three-year guys were determined to make an impact THIS YEAR.
So in the Fall of 2004, with the incoming group
of freshmen, the team held a week-long demonstration. It began with some
explanatory lectures. One of the school leaders, Li Wu Yi, had been very
supportive of the team, even allowing us to practice on the front gate oval
(where walking on the grass is prohibited) when we needed a place to
practice because the football (soccer) fields were full.
Li Wu Yi is that rarest of Chinese
Administrative Leaders. First of all, he can speak English. For all the
emphasis Chinese school administrators put on students studying English, it
is rare that you will find an administrator who can speak English himself.
(I say HIMself, because 95% of Chinese administrators, in addition to not
speaking English, are males.) So the team was lucky to find a patron in Li
Wu Yi.
Secondly, whenever Chinese administrators are
invited (asked) to attend a student gathering, they usually show up, and,
with great pomp and circumstance, give a
Da Zi (Big Words) speech and then ...
leave. Apparently, Chinese leaders gain great face, in their own minds, by
showing up, saying some
Da Zi, and walking out after they have
given their speech. Not Li Wu Yi. He stood up, said a few words, and then
sat back down to see what this baseball thing was about. And he stayed, and
listened attentively, even asking me questions from time-to-time. He was
truly interested in the students and what they were trying to accomplish. He
should be a model for Chinese administrators everywhere.
(This wasn't my first time to witness this exceptional characteristic
of Li. The first time I saw him was at the opening of the 2002 Foreign
Language College English Festival. Li had given a brief speech along
with 2 or 3 other leaders. At the conclusion of the speeches, all the
leaders walked out gaining (in their minds) great face from the students.
Except for Li. He stayed. Later, he came up and introduced himself. I was
touched and impressed by this man. He seemed to be a rarity among Chinese
administrators. In truth, the students respected Li for staying and watching
the ceremonies, too. He was a very well-liked man at ZJU's new campus.)
Anyway, back to the baseball seminar.... Li Wu
Yi stayed for the full hour and a half while, first I in English ,and then a
couple of other students in Chinese, explained the concept and basis of
baseball and our team. At the end, he stood up again and had some very kind
words for everyone, the most important of which was that he would "go to
bat" with the administration for the support of the baseball team. And he
meant it. Li Wu Yi does NOT speak
Da Zi. He speaks from his heart.
Following the seminar, we headed out to the Oval so the newbies could
have a chance to try their stuff. Here are some pictures from the tryouts:
In the end, the team got about 15 new players, 3 of them women. We now
had enough players to have intra-squad practices. And we had a fresh
corps of players to develop. In short, ZJU Baseball now had a farm team.
And spring training would be arriving just after the Spring Festival of
2005.
Spring arrived and the team started
practicing in earnest. But they needed competition. Zhejiang University
has a large (1000+) contingent of foreign students from many different
countries. Many of them come from "baseball-playing countries" and so a
call was sent out to baseball-playing foreign students to scrimmage
against the ZJU team. And the call was answered by a group of students
who had played ball back home - in Japan, Korea (South), Argentina,
Chile, Venezuela, Mexico, Cuba, and the U.S. (and an occasional Aussie
showing up).
Once or twice a month, on
Sundays, the ZJU team had a multi-cultural baseball fiesta. Despite the
anti-Japanese protests in China and Hangzhou during April, 2005, nobody
on the team cared. (Nor did U.S., Cubans, Argentineans,
Venezuelans or Chileans have problems with each other.) We all just
wanted to played ball. Baseball bridged all the political divides.
So now it was showtime. The core team had
been together for 3 years. Many of the vets would be graduating soon.
And the team was just a "club sport" as far as ZJU was concerned. These
guys wanted recognition. And recognition they deserved. So on a mild
April weekend, not long after the anit-Japanese protests in Hangzhou and
across China, they flaunted the national mood, and arranged a scrimmage
between us and the foreign students, most of whom were Japanese. And
they invited the Director of the Chinese University Sports (based in
Hangzhou) to attend. His organization is the equivalent of the NCAA. The
Director was also a dean of the College of Physical Ed. at ZJU and this
was the first time he had heard of the ZJU baseball team.
In typical Chinese leader fashion, he arrived late. But he had some
semblance of the Li Wu Yi spirit in him because
he stayed. And he watched. And he stayed longer. And he watched some
more. And then he asked some questions. And then as he was leaving, he
told the team that he would support their application for varsity
status.
This was important because the team
had a singular goal this year - to attend the China National University
Baseball Tournament. Yes, China has a national tournament in baseball
for universities. But it requires varsity status, as evidenced (in
typical Chinese fashion) by a red chop from the university on the
tournament application.
A week later, the
Director wrote a letter of recommendation to the university leaders (in
Chinese because, of course, Chinese leaders are, by and large,
illiterate in English). I believe that Li Wu Yi
also had filed a report in support. The team asked me to also write a
letter in support. I was little leery because, as just mentioned,
English is NOT a language that most Chinese leaders read nor understand,
despite their exhortations to the students to study English.
Nevertheless, I wrote the following letter in support of the
application. I doubted it would be read, much less understood, by the
leaders, so I wrote it from my heart and didn't try to simplify the
English. But just in case, I threw in some words that Chinese leaders
would grasp - like Olympics, Taiwan, Japan, and the names of other top
Chinese universities:
Since 2003, I have had the
honor of coaching a fine group of students from Zhejiang University – the
Zhejiang University Baseball Team.
I am currently teaching at
both the Zhejiang Education Institute and the Zhejiang University Continuing
Education Department (Xixi Campus), but in 2003, I was teaching in the
Zhejiang University Foreign Language College at Zijingang Campus. One day, a
student approached me at Zijingang Campus and asked if I would be interested
in coaching the baseball team they had recently formed. I love baseball and,
in fact, I had done some baseball coaching back in the U.S., so I eagerly
agreed.
What I met was a group of
dedicated Zhe Da students from many different areas of China, united
together by an interest and curiosity of the game of baseball. Three years
earlier, in the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, the Chinese Women’s Baseball team
had achieved phenomenal success and won the silver medal in the Olympic
event. I think this was the spark for my student’s interest in the game.
Since that small beginning,
the Zhe Da baseball team is now entering its 3rd season. The size
of the team has grown as newer students become captivated by the game and
wish to learn more. The enthusiasm the Baseball Team students have for the
game can be seen every time they take the field to play or practice. To
date, the team has received little support from the school itself and this
year they are seeking the support and backing of the university. I
wholeheartedly support them in this effort. Let me give you a few reasons
why:
-
The Zhe Da Baseball Team is the result of
the concerted efforts by the team members themselves to create another
recreational/physical education activity at Zijingang Campus.
-
The game of baseball requires development
of a number of different physical skills such as running, throwing, and
most importantly, hand-to-eye coordination both in hitting the ball and
catching the ball. It is said that hitting a speeding baseball is the
most difficult task of any sport.
-
Unlike some other sports such as
basketball or American football, good baseball players come in all
shapes and sizes. You do not have to be tall and/or strong to excel in
the sport. We can see how successful players from Taiwan and Japan have
become in the World of Baseball. There are 9 players on the field and
each position requires a different type of person. So students of all
sizes and skills can find a place on the team. Perhaps that’s why it is
the number 1 sport in the U.S. – everyone can have a chance to play and,
with practice, to become a good player. Thus it is an ideal sport for
schools and P.E. departments.
-
Baseball involves a lot of strategy. It
has been called “The Thinking Man’s Game”. So students develop their
thinking skills, as well. It also involves a lot of teamwork-another
important skill in forming an all-round student ready for society.
-
In 2008, Beijing will host the Olympic
Games. Baseball is one of the Olympic sports. As the games approach,
there is sure to be an increase in the number of people in China
interested in baseball.
-
Many of the top ten universities in China
have baseball teams. Bei Da, Qinghua, Nanda and Fudan all have teams. In
fact last year, the Fudan team came to Zijingang to play our team. They
had a favorable impression not only of our team, but also the beautiful
new Zijingang campus. Having a school-supported team will allow another
form of contact for Zhe Da with the other top universities in China.
For all these reasons, I
think the students of the Zhe Da Baseball Team deserve the support and
backing of the University and it is my sincerest hope that they gain the
recognition they so richly deserve and for which they have worked so hard. I
hope you will look favorably upon their application for support. Thank you.
And so it happened that a couple of weeks
later, I got a call on my cell phone right in the middle of class from one
of the team members. I saw the number and answered it quickly, but briefly:
"We're official!" he shouted.
"Way to go!" I answered back.
Then I did a little dance in front of my
students. They were confused because I rarely answer my cell phone in the
middle of class - and I never dance. At least not in class.
After class, I called back to find out the
details. Yes, we had been accorded official, varsity status (red chop and
all). That meant that the team could enter the China National University
Baseball Tournament to be held in July in Zhengzhou.
But the disappointing news came next. The
school would only offer them 2000 RMB funding. That wasn't even enough to
buy uniforms (oh, I forgot to mention, we had no uniforms). But the guys had
been funding themselves for the last 3 years and at least we had bats and
gloves and balls. And a red chop into the national tournament. The players
were ecstatic.
Now, they set to work in earnest to prepare.
Scrimmages with the "foreign students" became a weekly occurrence. Uniforms
were designed, the shortfall to be paid for by each player. The application
for the national tournament was prepared. And then...a problem.
I had been coaching them, but I wasn't a
member of the P.E. Department. Nor, of course, was I Chinese. They needed a
Chinese coach for the application because, I was told, the school required
reports and meetings in Chinese. ZJU had about 60,000 students and, god
knows how many thousand Chinese teachers, but the only Chinese in the whole
university community who knew anything about baseball were the players
themselves. Except for one.
We got really lucky because, as it happened,
the PE department had recently admitted a guy from Tianjin in northern China
as a post-graduate student. He had some experience practicing with the
Tianjin professional team in the
China Baseball League. He
was a post-grad....so that could qualify him as a coach. And, as an enrolled
student, we had a BONUS! He could play on the roster. Indeed, he came to the
team as a pitcher. And he could throw a curve. It was the first time that
any of my players, Luo Jia
included, had ever seen, much less tried to hit or catch - a curve ball.
Double Happiness! Now we were in for the
national tournament. And we had a pitcher.
OK, I'm going to make a rare, but sweeping
statement here. Let me preface it by saying that I rarely say really nasty
things about China in these pages. But I want o say this: Charitable giving
in China....basically, doesn't exist. Let me explain.
In western countries, if
there is a good cause, charitable, educational, or social, westerners will
flock to donate towards the cause. Even the common man. But in China, though
there are a few charities (most of which are infested by corruption), by and
large, Chinese people just won't contribute to a worthy cause. The reasons
are manifold: 1. there hasn't been a culture of charitable giving in China's
long history; (2) many Chinese expect a monetary quid pro quo when they pay
money (i.e. the Chinese circulatory system pretty much stops at the
wallet...and the warm, fuzzy feeling of helping a good cause often never
reaches the Chinese heart); and/or (3) many of the few recent charitable
orgs set up here for various causes are rife with corruption. Why? See
reasons (1) and (2).
Why am I bringing this up here? Well, the
team had been funding themselves out of their own pockets for 3 years. When
they finally achieved varsity status, the school gave them a paltry 2,000
RMB but the more important red chop to enter the national tournament. And
now it was time to make plans for that tournament. It would require a tidy
sum of money (by Chinese standards). The tournament required each team to
have two full sets of uniforms. We had none so far. The tournament would be
held in Zhengzhou, Henan province and would last from 7 to 14 days
(depending on whether a team cleared the first round). The team also planned
to spend 7 days in Chengdu at the China National Baseball Training facility
practicing with the China Baseball team. (One of my players was from Chengdu
and had made the acquaintance of the team and received an invitation to
train there.) All of this would require travel expenses to Chengdu and
Zhengzhou, the entrance fee to the tournament, plus day-to-day living
expenses. The players decided the traveling squad would be about 20. They
put together a very frugal budget of 20,000 RMB.
Uniform costs are very cheap in China. After
all, the same expensive baseball uniforms you buy for your kids in the local
Wal-Mart are made here. As an example, I had an extra 10 ZJU baseball caps
made for my friends and family back home which I paid for myself. Total cost
- 72 RMB. That's less than a dollar a cap for the same type and quality
baseball cap you think is a good deal at $20 at Wal-Mart.
Still 20,000 RMB is a tidy sum to Chinese
students, so I suggested that we try to find some sponsors. The first thing
I inquired about was whether the College Baseball Association had rules
against corporate sponsors logos on their uniforms. Unlike NCAA rules in the
U.S., there were no such restrictions here. Ha! I thought! That should make
it easy!
Wrong!
First, I had a student in my adult class at
ZJU who was a regional sales manager for a Giant European mobile phone
manufacturer (which shall remain nameless) which has a large office and
research center in Hangzhou. So I asked him if his company might sponsor the
team in the national tournament for the paltry (to a Giant European Company)
sum of $2,500. He's a very gung-ho guy (that's how he got to be a regional
sales manager) and he thought, "Sure, this is a good cause!" He'd pass along
a request for promotional funding. But it fell on deaf ears, at last. Though
the Giant European company is a western company, the local manager in charge
of funding is Chinese. (See the first paragraph of this section.)
But my buddy wouldn't give up. He then
approached one of his biggest customers - a Giant Chinese Telecommunications
Company (which shall remain nameless). Their response? Well, Zhejiang
University is the biggest institution in Hangzhou (indeed, the largest
university in China) and the Giant Chinese Telecommunications Company said
they spend enough money every year on promoting their service at ZJU, thank
you very much, and didn't see any benefit to supporting 20 students when the
university itself wasn't giving them that much. But I could forgive a Giant
European Company and a Giant Chinese Telecommunications Company for not
having much interest in an American sport.
I sometimes would run into a couple of
American's here who were overseeing two tire plants that a Big American Tire
Company (that shall remain nameless) had set up near Hangzhou to manufacture
lower-cost tires. One of the managers seemed very interested. Indeed, he
said he had played college ball back home when he was younger. He came out
to one of the scrimmages and got a chance to play shortstop on the foreign
students' team. He thought it was a good idea to support the team. The Big
American Tire Companyy had recently entered China under a joint venture. At
the moment, one of the conditions the government had put on them setting up
the tire factories was that all output be exported. (The tires on your cars
may well have come from their car tire factory here in Hangzhou.) But they
were hoping to eventually get permission to sell their tires domestically in
China and he thought it would be a good idea to show some support for a
local school's athletic team. So he put in a request for a paltry (to an
American tire company) $2,500.
But alas, he was in charge of the production
end of the tire enterprise - the financial side of the enterprise was
controlled by a Chinese manager. End result - $0. (See the first paragraph
of this section, again.)
And so, the team pared back their plans, cut
out the Chengdu training trip, and reduced their budget. I reached in my own
pocket and donated some money which, together with the money previously
given by ZJU, was enough to cover half the cost the players would incur. The
other half would have to come from their own pockets once more. (In
addition, I would cover my own travel and lodging costs at the tournament.)
And so with no outside funding in sight, we
turned towards preparations for the tournament. Two weeks before the team
was to set off for Zhengzhou, the uniforms were delivered. The players were
ecstatic. Their first real baseball uniforms.
Uniform Day Practice
At last, at least --- we looked like a
baseball team. And we are on our way to Zhengzhou for the Nationals
Chen Lu - Team Captain says, "See you in Zhengzhou..."
Next Chapter
