The 2012 SBL Draft is scheduled to take place on Aug. 1 in Taipei, the Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA) said.
For the first time, the CTBA said, a pre-draft physical would be held so teams could better understand physical conditions of the applicants.
The draft order will be the reverse of the ranking from the last season with Bank of Taiwan receiving the No. 1 pick.
Hsu Chih-chao, head coach of the Kinmen Kaoliang Liquor (KKL) last season, will become Dacin Tiger’s head coach in the coming season, Dacin Tigers General Manager Wang Tsai-hsiang said.
Hsu, who spent most of his career with Dacin, will be returning to his old team and replace Chiu Ta-tsun, who left after the season to coach in China’s Jiangsu.
SBL team meeting convened by the CTBA today reach a consensus that the 2012-13 SBL regular season will tip off on Nov. 17 this year.
Among the important decisions made in the meeting include the acceptance of players of Taiwanese descent for the first time with each team is allowed to keep two such players who possess a ROC (Taiwan) passport.
The players with Taiwanese descent would not be counted as import players.
Dacin Tigers and Taiwan Beer will meet in the opening game of the 2011-12 SBL season on Dec. 17 at Miaoli Dome in the central city of Miaoli, the Chinese Taipei Basketball Association announced.
For the first time, SBL games will be scheduled to play in the southern city of Greater Kaohsiung, Taiwan's second largest city. The regular season games from Jan.6-8 will be played at Kaohsiung Dome with a capacity of over 10,000.
The CTBA plans to hold a national conference to discuss the future direction of Taiwanese basketball after Taiwan NT finishing for a somewhat disappointing eighth place in the 2011 Asian Championship. The CNA report is as follows:
Taiwan will not recruit Golden State Warriors guard Jeremy Lin for the 2011 FIBA Asia Championship in Wuhan, China due to Lin's knee injury, Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA) President Ting Shou-chung said Friday.
Taiwan's basketball federation will include Jeremy Lin, the first Taiwanese-American in the NBA, in its 24-man preliminary roster for the 2011 FIBA Asia Championship for Men, Taiwan media quoted Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA) President Ting Shou-chung as saying.
The Super Basketball League (SBL) will adopt a new height limit of 6-9 (205cm) to replace its current limit of 6-7 (200cm) in the 2011-12 season while the monthly salary cap will stay at the current US$10,000, Taiwanese media reported.
The CTBA will be sending out seven national teams this year for eight international competitions:
Men's:
East Asian Basketball Championship, June 10-15, Nanjing, China
FIBA Asia Championship, September 15-25, Wuhan, Hubei, China
FIBA U19 World Championship, June 30-July 10, Latvia
FIBA Asia U16 Championship, October 18-28, Nha Trang, Vietnam
Women's:
FIBA Asia Championship, August 21-28, Nagasaki, Japan
World University Games, August 12-23, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
FIBA U19 World Championship, July 21-31, Chile
FIBA Asia U16 Championship, October 5-12, Urumqi, Xinjiang, China
Former NBA head coach and current Tokyo Apache head coach Bob Hill will become the technical consultant for the Taiwan NT during the East Asian Basketball Championship and the FIBA Asia Championship this year, local media reported.
[No Tien Lei (middle) and Tseng Wen-ting (right) for Taiwan NT this year. Lee Hsueh-lin (left) returned from China to be back with the team.]
The Chinese Taipei Basketball Association on Friday announced the final roster for the upcoming East Asian Basketball Championship, the qualifying tournament for the 2011 FIBA Asia Championship.
The 12-man lineup is led by three core players who played last season in China, including former Taiwan Beer forward Lin Chih-chieh and a pair of ex-Yulon Luxgen stars -- forward Chen Hsin-an and point guard Lee Hsueh-lin.
Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA) announced that the Women's Super Basketball League (WSBL) will open its 2011 season on January 10 and, for the first time in 10 years, as many as six teams will compete in the highest level of Taiwanese women's basketball.
The participating teams of the new season will be the defending champion Taiyuan Textile, Taipower, Chunghwa Telecom, Fo Guang, the expansion team Applause Red Devils and Cathay Life, which returns to the league after a one-year hiatus.
Taiyuan and Cathay Life were favored to meet in the Finals.
Cathay Life, which had won 17 straight titles in Taiwanese women's league, withdrew from the 2010 WSBL season over what it claimed was a violation by Chunghwa Telecom in signing Chiang Feng-chun, a former Cathay Life star forward who came out of retirement.
Chiang subsequently finished her one-year contract with Chunghwa Telecom before signing with Zhejiang of the Chinese women's league WCBA (Women's Chinese Basketball Association) in October.
The regular season will be played from Jan. 10-March 30 at Taipei Gymnasium, located in downtown Taipei, and Sinjhuang Stadium in nearby Xinbei City. Top four teams in the regular season advance to the playoffs. No. 3 and No. 4 teams meet in the best-of-three bronze medal series while the top two teams meet in the best-of-three WSBL Finals.
Popularity of women's basketball in Taiwan lagged far behind the men's competition as the number of teams decreased over the years. According to the CTBA, the last time there were six women's teams in Taiwan's top division was in 2001.
The CTBA is still in talks with several companies in order to put the WSBL games on television or the internet.
CTBA SBL website
Hinet SBL website
After seven long years, the SBL finally had an official website of its own that contains real-time score and box scores. Up next, I think the league will have an English website… in 10 years.
Anyway, the SBL website is hosted under the CTBA (Chinese Taipei Basketball Association) which operates the SBL. The URL is http://sbl.basketball-tpe.org/
For those who understand Chinese, feel free to check the box scores on the website. It also contains a section of game results and box scores in the past seven years but the section appears to be under construction at this moment.
The league's partner Chunghwa Telecom -- Taiwan's largest landline, mobile phone and internet operator -- also presents a SBL website at http://sports.hinet.net/sbl
The Hinet website does not provide box scores, but it does provide live streaming and videos on-demand.
Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA) released the complete schedule and team rosters for the 2011 Super Basketball League (SBL) season Thursday as the new season is scheduled to tip off on Dec. 25.
A total of 105 games will be played in the regular season from Dec. 25, 2010 to March 20, 2011 in four venues across the country, including Sinjhuang Stadium in the newly formed Xinbei City, Yilan University Gymnasium in the eastern city of Yilan, Taipei Gymnasium in downtown Taipei City and Fengshan Gymnasium in the southern city of Fengshan, Kaohsiung.
Every team will play a 30-game regular season, meeting each of its six opponents five times.
The top four teams will advance to the playoffs, which is scheduled to be played from March 23, 2011 to April 17. Starting from this season, the first round playoffs will adopt the best-of-seven format as well as the finals.
One import player is allowed for every team. The import registration deadline is on Feb. 12, 2011, which means that teams are free to change their imports before that day.
Former Taiwan Beer star forward Lin Chih-chieh and former Yulon point guard Lee Hsueh-lin were not among the final rosters because they will spend the 2011 season in China. Sun Hwan-po, last season's rookie of the year, left Bank of Taiwan for unknown reasons.
According to the CTBA, four of the seven teams were set on their import players -- Zachary Atkinson with Pure Youth, Jason Faulknor with Bank of Taiwan, Keith Gayden with Dacin and an unidentified player with Taiwan Mobile. I'm still checking on his name.
One thing to note though. According to various sources of information, Atkinson was listed at 206cm, which exceeds the SBL's original height limit of 200cm. I'm not sure whether the league has altered or abandoned the height limit. Will check up on that as well.
I will post the full schedule and the full rosters on this blog as soon as possible.
Taipei, Nov. 24 (CNA) Taiwan men's national basketball team dropped out of the quarterfinal this week, losing to the Philippines and finishing with one win and four losses in the preliminary round of the competition at the 2010 Asian Games in Guangzhou, China.
However, the loss was not widely reported in Taiwan, as it appeared to have been overshadowed by the controversial disqualification of Taiwanese taekwondo athlete Yang Shu-chun, an issue that has been the center of media attention for the past week.
Huang Chao-he, secretary-general of the Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA), said that the association was expecting non-stop calls from disgruntled fans the day after Taiwan lost 82-73 to the Philippines on Nov. 22.
However, the CTBA did not get any irate calls, despite the fact that it was the first time that Taiwan was knocked out of the final eight in Asiad men's basketball.
Yang's return to Taipei from Guangzhou on Nov. 23 probably eclipsed the basketball team's loss, Huang said.
But while the CTBA may have gained some breathing space, it still has to figure out why its men's team won only one game -- against India -- and lost to Japan, Qatar, Iran and the Philippines, Huang said.
The 2010 Taiwan's men's national basketball team was hampered by the absence of 2.04-meter starting center Tseng Wen-ting, who skipped the event because of injury.
The team's poor showing marred the debut of Taiwan head coach Zhang Xulei, who grew up in China and played for the Chinese national team in his 20's, and was a setback for the CTBA in its plan to nurture local coaches.
South Korean head coach Chung Kwang-suk led Taiwan to fifth place in the 2009 FIBA Asia men's basketball championship, its best finish in the tournament since 1999.
Is the trend really inevitable? I don't know. And I hope it's not…
Taiwan basketball team's China bid sparks 'brawn drain' fear
by Amber Wang – Sun Nov 21, 1:36 am ET
TAIPEI (AFP) – A leading Taiwanese basketball team's bid to join China's professional league has intensified concerns on the island that it is suffering a "brawn drain" to its giant neighbour.
The Taiwan Beer side, championship winners in 2006-7 and 2007-8, recently announced that it wants to play in the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) league, adding to an emerging exodus of players heading for the mainland.
"We cannot stop players from making the most of their limited athletic lives but rather than losing one after another to Chinese teams, our team could join the CBA," said head coach Richard Yan.
The team, named after the signature product of its main sponsor, Taiwan Tobacco and Liquor Corp., would attract more backers and offer better deals to players once in the CBA, he said.
The plan raised a few eyebrows, with basketball authorities saying they opposed the team moving its big shots to China while leaving junior players in Taiwan's Super Basketball League (SBL).
"Of course we hope top players stay in Taiwan... We don't want the SBL to become a sideshow to the CBA," said Huang Chao-her, secretary-general of the Chinese Taipei Basketball Association.
While the association does not bar individual players from moving to China, it would be difficult for the Taiwan Beer team to get the green light because it has a state-funded sponsor, Huang said.
"Such a move would require the approval of various government agencies in charge of sports, labour, finance and China affairs. It is a very complicated matter," said Huang.
Several top coaches reportedly backed Taiwan Beer, saying it is inevitable for local teams to tap into China's vast market in the wake of dwindling box office income and funding.
For years Taiwan's top athletes have gone to powerhouses such as the United States and Japan in the hope of taking their careers to the next level, but increasing they are setting their sights on China.
"The trend of going to China is unstoppable," said Chu Yen-shuo, a Beijing-based Taiwanese sport critic and former chief editor of Hoop Taiwan magazine.
"Just like many European players joined the NBA, it's only natural that people want to move where there is more money," he said, adding top Chinese players can earn up to five times more than their Taiwanese peers.
Lin Chih-chieh, a former star forward of Taiwan Beer, was among the players and coaches who jumped on the bandwagon when he joined the Guangsha Lions in eastern Zhejiang province last year.
"China's environment is more competitive. There are more teams and I can vie with top Chinese and foreign players," Lin told AFP in a telephone interview.
"It's a great opportunity to improve myself and boost my career. At my age it's now or never for me to take on the challenge," said the 28-year-old.
Basketball -- both America's NBA and the homegrown game -- is wildly popular in China, with hundreds of millions of Chinese regularly watching NBA matches on television.
Dozens of US players are playing in China's professional leagues, with the highest-profile addition being the former NBA All Star Stephon Marbury, who joined the Shanxi Brave Dragons this year.
Lin warned that Taiwanese players need to brace themselves for a major challenge if they want to play in the stressful and physically demanding Chinese league.
Huang, of Taiwan's basketball association, cited the case of Sina Lions as a warning about the dangers of wishful thinking about China.
The first Taiwanese team to join the CBA quit in 2003 after only two years, blaming adjustment problems, he said.
China is also wooing the island's top talents in other fields such as baseball and billiards, as a recent improvement in ties between two sides spills over into sports.
But Beijing hit a nerve when it reportedly went after the island's sport icon, golf queen Yani Tseng, with a five-million-US-dollar annual sponsorship deal. The world's number two golfer has said she will only play for Taiwan.
The more alarming development for local fans is perhaps in baseball, where Taiwanese coaches have been credited with having played an important part in China's rise in the sport.
Since splitting from China six decades ago, Taiwan has lost to its giant rival in nearly every sporting arena, but had prided itself over its prowess in baseball.
That confidence has been shattered, with the Taiwanese squad suffering humiliating defeats to China in two international matches since 2008, at a time when the island's favourite sport was hit by game-rigging scandals.
It is unclear how many Taiwanese are currently coaching in China but local media reported this year that Chinese teams were planning to recruit at least 20 new coaches from the island.
Taiwan's pro-baseball league reportedly also intends to establish a new team in China, which will consist of players from both sides and could travel to Taiwan to play.
The league's officials were not immediately available for comment.
Taiwan Beer made the front page last week when the United Evening News reported that the team has submitted its application to the Chinese Basketball Association in an attempt to become the Chinese leagues' expansion team.
If TB eventually gets accepted by the 17-team league, it will become the second Taiwanese team to join the CBA after Sina Lions, which played in the CBA from 2002-2003. And of course, it will be a huge story.
Taiwan Beer said that it would not "leave" the seven-team Super Basketball League as most people think. So it's not exactly an exodus. Instead, it planned to keep its "B-team, " composed of inferior players, in the SBL and bring it's A-Team to China.
The Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA), Taiwan's basketball governing body, and the Sports Affairs Council (SAC), the country's top sports governing body, both denied that they were supportive of the plan.
The CTBA said that it has not received official document from TB about the move while the SAC said that if TB did submit an application, the final approval will be a decision by an inter-agency meeting between the SAC, the Ministry of Justice, the Council of Labor Affairs and the Mainland Affairs Council, given the complex and unique relations between Taiwan and China.
The situation was even more complex because the Taiwan government is the majority shareholder of TB's parent company, Taiwan Tobacco and Liquor Corp. Imagine what it's like and what the political implication will be when a state-controlled Taiwanese team plays in a Chinese league with teams from other provinces.
The CTBA, SAC and Mainland Affairs Council people are not stupid. They know this would be a serious problem and could pose serious ramification in the future.
If TB ends up playing in China, where it chooses its home city will also be a difficult technical issue. It would be easier if it chooses a Chinese city, like what Sina did when it played in Suzhou, as its home court. If it decides to make Taipei its home court, it means that the other 17 Chinese teams will have to fly in Taipei to play their road games against Taiwan Beer. That will make things much more complicated and stir up political debates again.
I talked to CTBA secretary-general Huang Chao-ho about this. Huang said that the CTBA is not happy about TB's plan to bring its top players to China and leave inferior players in Taiwan, saying that "no association would accept an idea like this."
A basketball official also told me that the CTBA has had conversation with Chinese Basketball Management Center, Chinese authority of basketball, about TB's plan earlier this year when the plan first surfaced.
The center said, the official recalled, it would be "almost impossible" for the authority to accept TB's application, basketball management wise, because there are already tons of basketball teams in China, especially in its second division, set their eyes on joining the first division.
"Unless it becomes a political decision that comes down straight from the top, " the Chinese official was quoted as saying, referring to TB's application bid could possibly become a political decision eventually.
Additionally, the announcement looked like a unilateral decision of TB head coach Yen Chia-hwa, who has been known for his intention to bring the team over to China, thinking that the relocation would be able to boost the team's popularity and profitability, after TTL President Duan Wei denied that he was aware of the plan.
My friend Robin Chu, who is currently living in China and works as a basketball columnist, wrote down his observation in these two columns (in Mandarin): "It's not that easy" (沒那麼簡單) and "What's the hurry?" (台啤急什麼? )
Anyway, looks like the attempt will be blocked for now due to its complexity.
However, this attempt did pose serious concerns in the long run. During the past few years there have been more Taiwanese players, such as Chen Hsin-an, Lin Chih-chieh and Lee Hsueh-lin, signing with Chinese teams individually and Taiwanese basketball is in jeopardy of hollowing out.
Now the CTBA fears that it will bring a domino effect if TB does leave Taiwan. Yulon Luxgen has also mentioned bringing the team to China because it serves the interests of its mother corporation Yulon Motors, which has established auto factories in southeastern China.
