2024 Korean Baseball Organization League Champions: The KIA Tigers

By LUKE CHON, V MURDAYA, LEVI STOLL, ISLA WIEGAND-HAMMOND

Ecstatic chants and the rhythmic beat of a drum shook throughout the Gwangju-KIA Champions Field as fans, draped in loyal red and white as pictured on the jumbotron in bated breath, all eyes set on pitcher Jung Hai-young on the mound. Jung, 23 years of age and now five years into his stint with the KIA Tigers since his draft in 2020, had assumed the reputation of a reliable closer, one who racked in consistent numbers and regularly handled the duty of safely concluding a game. Now, after nearly seven months of competitive baseball, Jung’s season and his mark on KBO (Korean Baseball Organization) history would culminate in this final at-bat, a series of pitches that would dictate a first franchise victory for the Tigers since 2017.

On Oct. 28, 2024, Game 5 of the annual Korean Series commenced in Gwangju city of the South Jeolla province. After months of domestic baseball, the Samsung Lions and the KIA Tigers had risen to the pinnacle of the competition, each emulating their subpar league performances the previous year with finishes at the top of the standings. The Lions arrived at Champions Field to a booming Tigers audience, a raucous crowd that only intensified in energy as Jung, on the ninth-inning mark, landed batter Kim Seong-yoon on a two-out, two-strike count. With his 13th pitch of the game, a high-rising 150km (93 mile) fastball, Jung would seal the series, the empty-bearing swing of Kim’s bat hitting nothing but air. The stadium erupted, red caps flew, and Jung immediately rushed to his catcher counterpart in joyous celebration. Jung would confirm the Tigers’ 12th Korean Series victory that night, extending the league’s record for all-time championships.

Baseball in Korea is a passionately enjoyed sport associated with impassioned cheering, faithful following, and unending playlists of chants for every ocassion. From new signings to veteran players to urging one’s team to push through, fans will synchronize in reciting and belting out lyrics after lyrics ingrained in memory. This unified effort and outpouring of a pure, raw love for one’s team demonstrates Korea’s high regard for baseball culture and the KBO community. Since its inauguration in 1982, the KBO has formed a sturdy backbone of supporters spread out across the nation. Initially popularized by the American missionary Phillip L. Gillette, baseball emerged as an engaging sporting escape and quickly and indelibly clung to Korean culture, maintaining its place on the television screens of family homes, bars, and the cover stories of newspapers. 

Both the KIA Tigers and the Samsung Lions date back to the inauguration of the KBO in 1982. As is common for the majority of Korean baseball teams, the KIA Tigers were formerly the ‘Haitai Tigers,’ where the sponsor of a large conglomerate or company brand endorses the club. The Tigers, sold by Haitai Foods in 2001 as a result of bankruptcy and poor financings, were promptly purchased by the conglomerate Hyundai Motors, the parent company of the KIA brand. Other teams, such as the Samsung Lions, SSG Landers (Shinsegae Department Stores), LG Twins, and more are all separate entities under the proprietary leash of a major South Korean company. In this sense, baseball not only embodies a much-loved social event but also mobilizes public marketing and embraces a unique business promotional model. Thus, the annual Korean Series matchups is a contest not limited to players and the clubs they represent, but the broader economic scale of things as well.

This series, however, bears a particular significance that resonates beyond a feisty crowd or a competitive marketing rivalry. Both the Tigers and the Lions have had strongholds on the KBO for decades, arguably two of the most iconic and statistically best teams in the league’s relatively short history. The Tigers have the most championship titles among Korean teams with twelve, followed by the Lions with eight. Throughout the years, both teams have seen the rise of some of the greatest legends in KBO history. KIA boasts a generation consisting of highly celebrated pitcher Sun Dong-yol, the “Son of the Wind” Lee Jong-beom (whose son now bats for the San Francisco Giants), and current manager Lee Bum-ho. Samsung has produced its own superstars as well. Lee Seung-yuop, regarded as the greatest hitters in KBO history and the youngest ever player worldwide to reach 300 career home runs, spent much of his career with the Lions, playing an instrumental role in the team’s four-year dominion between 2011 and 2014, where they won the league consecutive titles and first cemented their baseball legacy. 

The rivalry perpetuates beyond the stadium as well. Not only are the Tigers and the Lions two of the best teams in KBO history, but they also represent the division and turmoil rooted within South Korean politics of the past. The KIA Tigers are based in Gwangju, Jeolla Province, a city regarded as a cradle for liberalism. Gwangju is particularly known for the Gwangju Uprising of May 18th, 1980, commonly referred to as “5.18,” a series of demonstrations against then-president Chun Doo-hwan’s anti-democratic rise to power and tyrannical regime. The Lions, on the other hand, are based in Daegu, Gyeongsang Province, the hub for conservative Korean politics, and therefore an area of conflicting ideological thinking. Thus, the rivalry between the Tigers and the Lions were seen as an extension of the political animosity between the two regions. The hostility reached its zenith in 1986, when a mob of angry fans burnt the Haitai Tigers team bus after the Lions lost game 3 of the Korean Series that year.

This is why KIA’s triumph in this year’s rendition of the Korean Series harbors immense history and significance. The Samsung Lions have yet to win a championship since its streak of winning ended in 2014, a decade in the aftermath tittered with discrepant performances and frustrating results on the field. The team’s continued misfortunes were exacerbated with Jung’s confident, final pitch, concluding a series that many could not look beyond KIA comfortably pursuing. Despite all of this, we have yet to confront the overarching question: how is this news, happening internationally in South Korea, relevant to our PEA community and what can we take away from KIA’s dominant grasp on Korean Baseball?

The coinciding time period of the Korean Series and Exeter’s own upcoming E/a week perhaps permeates an omen of sorts regarding The Academy’s impending successes at its events away from home. KIA, a team known for its dashing red uniforms, symbolizes Big Red, whereas the subordinate Samsung roster, decked in a smurf-like blue and white spreading from their cleats and socks to their jersey designs, draws parallels to Andover’s palette. One cannot look beyond the 4-1 Korean Series results won in favor of KIA last month, the Tigers’ historical dominance over the KBO as evident in their record number of championship wins, and past encounters with Samsung in previous postseason matchups. KIA emerged the winner in the 1986, 1987, 1993, and 2024’s Korean Series over the Samsung Lions, overwhelmingly dominating the blue in the matches that matter. As Exeter’s Varsity teams prepare the buses to Massachusetts this coming Saturday, the victorious red and white colors embraced by the KIA Tigers and their devoted fan base set a clairvoyant omen signaling Big Red’s sure and all but confirmed dominance this weekend.