Chapter 94
Chapter 94
Translation: Godtl
Currently, the professional baseball teams operating in South Korea were reporting annual losses in the tens of billions of won for major corporations.
That's why you occasionally see companies cutting their losses and exiting the baseball team business.
But even so, there was a reason why many large corporations still maintained their teams.
"They see intangible value that isn't immediately visible. Since it's the most popular sport in our country, the promotional effects are naturally tremendous."
Last year alone, stadium attendance reached a staggering 8.4 million.
Add to that the fans watching on TV and various statistics showing that over 10 million people in Korea prefer baseball.
In other words, you simply can't ignore that level of promotional impact.
"A baseball team can be used as a tool to elevate brand image, strengthen internal employee cohesion, and even count as social contribution. That's why corporations endure hundreds of billions in losses to keep them running."
Some say it's just because conglomerate chairmen enjoy it as a hobby, but that's only half true.
If you maintain a team and then suddenly disband it, you risk facing severe backlash. Rather than spending marketing budgets elsewhere, it's more effective to leverage the promotional benefits of team operations.
Of course, there's also some degree of personal sentiment from team owners who simply love sports.
But I wasn't particularly fond of baseball, nor did I have a team I supported.
"So buying a baseball team can be good for marketing, but it'll never turn a profit?"
"I doubt any team has ever turned a profit. That said, losses have decreased compared to the past. As baseball's popularity keeps rising, advertising revenue has grown along with it. Still, it's not enough to completely offset the losses..."
"Well, it's not like they're running a team to make money in the first place. As you said, Vice President, it's about marketing."
If you asked whether it was effective, experts would say the impact is surprisingly significant. Especially in cases like Kangsung—every time they launch a new product, they bombard baseball games with all kinds of ads.
Other companies do the same.
"So what should we advertise?"
"We have plenty. Enflix, PicPic, KW Exchange, Gwangun Securities, and so on. Especially the new delivery platform we're launching with Kangsung Mart. It'll be an extremely effective marketing tool for us."
"That sounds good. But, Vice President."
"Yes?"
"You're unusually passionate today, aren't you?"
"I... am?"
"Yeah. By any chance, were you an NX Rangers fan?"
"!?"
My brother saw right through him.
"Was I that obvious?"
"You're usually as calm as a still lake no matter what happens, but you got all excited talking about this. Of course it was obvious. So this is why they say baseball fans change personalities. Don't tell me you scream and curse at every game?"
"N-not to that extent."
"Your face says otherwise."
"..."
I can't even imagine our ever-composed Vice President spewing profanities.
Baseball must be a terrifying sport.
Come to think of it, Hye-rin said she likes baseball too.
Surely that angelic person wouldn't...?
"Actually, I'm glad. I've been curious about something myself."
"What's that?"
"Which team does Chairman Jeong Jin-ho support?"
"I don't really have one."
"Y-you don't watch baseball much, then?"
"Occasionally."
"Then why buy a team...?"
"Exactly. I thought maybe you wanted to acquire one because you love watching baseball, Jin-ho. That's why I was going along with it."
"As the Vice President said, shouldn't we focus on marketing too? We need to promote KW Exchange and the new platform we're launching to compete with Lupin."
Though I said those words, the truth was I'd never once considered acquiring a baseball team before.
"But if we really do end up acquiring a team, I might try to develop it as a hobby."
At that, the vice president's face brightened like the sun.
It was like watching a veteran gamer encountering a clueless newbie wandering lost in the game.
"Then perhaps the chairman could join us in this hobby as well."
"Ugh. I never really watched much baseball either."
"I'll teach you properly. It's easier than you think."
"What if I get so frustrated watching that I end up wanting to flip the entire team upside down?"
"That's part of the charm, actually. They say baseball contains the full spectrum of human emotions - joy, anger, sorrow, and delight."
I'd heard eating fried chicken with beer while watching baseball was incredibly satisfying.
It might also be fun to go watch games with employees later.
"But Vice President..."
"Ah, yes?"
"Is it really that difficult to make money with a baseball team?"
"Well... even if you somehow manage profits through advertising, uniforms, and merchandise, the annual operating costs run into tens of billions. Unless the team becomes phenomenally successful and turns into Korea's most popular franchise, turning a profit would be extremely difficult."
"I see..."
So was my intuition ultimately telling me to acquire a team for marketing purposes after all?
"Ah! But there is one way. We could acquire players cheaply during drafts or free agency, develop them well, then sell them at higher prices. If you combine various ancillary revenues with player trade fees, while turning a full profit might be hard, you could at least minimize losses."
"But would that be easy?"
"Of course not. If you could develop one star player well enough to send them to Japan or America, that would be ideal, but that's very difficult. Producing star players in general is tough."
"Most importantly, none of this is possible unless we actually acquire a team first, right? Have negotiations begun?"
Just as my brother said.
All this could wait until after we'd acquired the team.
"We've made initial contact. Other shareholders are willing to sell, but the problem is former CEO Yang Chang-seok, the majority shareholder. He's currently detained by prosecutors for embezzlement, but doesn't seem willing to relinquish his shares."
"Is he trying to drive a hard bargain, or does he genuinely not want to sell?"
"It appears he wants to bargain."
Both my brother and I frowned deeply.
"Sigh. From what I've heard, that Rangers team is notorious for providing almost no support to players."
"Yes. Other teams provide drinks and snacks, but this team has none of that. Moreover, they immediately sell any player whose value rises even slightly. They're infamous for never acquiring star players."
"What, they don't develop talented rookies?"
"Correct. They just cut costs to the absolute minimum."
"Then why do you support such a team?"
"Good question. But you know... once you develop an attachment, it's hard to let go. Haha. And ironically, our team has the smallest fanbase."
Perhaps that very reason created this acquisition opportunity.
The problem was the majority shareholder CEO stubbornly holding on.
He seemed determined to squeeze out every last penny.
"I'll do my best to negotiate this deal properly."
"Good. Don't give that thief too much."
"Yes."
As we wrapped up our conversation and were leaving, the vice president's words suddenly came back to me.
Buying players cheap and selling them high...
Isn't this exactly like stock trading?
＊＊＊
"Who's acquiring what?"
"I hear Gwangun is participating in acquiring the Rangers team this time."
"What? Suddenly?"
Chairman Kang Sung-ho tilted his head in confusion.
"Did their chairman like baseball too?"
"Rumors say it's being pushed by President Jeong Jin-ho."
"President Jeong? How curious. I never heard he liked baseball."
"Perhaps he's aiming for marketing and publicity effects?"
"Well, that might be part of it, but does he really need to buy a baseball team? Must be a personal hobby. The man's got money to spare—can't blame him for having one expensive hobby, can you?"
Come to think of it, he had no idea what kind of hobbies Jeong Jin-ho usually enjoyed.
Every time they met, it was always just business talk.
He'd thought he knew Jin-ho a little better by now, but apparently not.
So he had hobbies like that, huh.
"Hmm. Maybe I should visit a baseball stadium myself—it's been a while."
"But Chairman, don't you dislike baseball?"
"Right. I've said it before, haven't I? Frankly, I've never liked the idea of dumping money into sports."
But unlike Kang Sung-ho, his late father had been a sports enthusiast.
That's why he'd established teams across multiple sports and kept investing in them.
Cutting it all off would've felt like disrespect, so he'd left them be.
"Still, baseball has far greater marketing and promotional impact compared to other sports. Even if you scrap everything else, you should hold onto baseball until the end."
"How's our team doing these days?"
"...Not well. Probably won't even make the postseason."
Tsk. "This is exactly why I hate baseball. If they were good, fine—but every damn time I go to a game, they lose."
He'd never been particularly fond of baseball to begin with, nor did he have any attachment to the pro teams. But if Jin-ho's hobby was baseball, Kang Sung-ho was more than willing to develop a taste for it.
"So, how's the acquisition going?"
"Not well. The current CEO, who's in for embezzlement, is stubbornly holding on, making the acquisition difficult. At this rate, it might fail, and they'll just end up bringing in another sponsor like they did with NX—keeping only the name."
"That bastard's greed knows no bounds."
"He was already arrested for embezzlement, but now that someone's offering to buy his shares, he's trying to squeeze every last penny out of it."
Kang Sung-ho frowned.
He really didn't like this guy.
On top of that, Jin-ho was finally taking a break from work to enjoy a hobby, and this bastard had to get in the way?
"Find out who's handling the investigation. A guy like that won't have just one or two crimes under his belt. Dig deeper—make sure they push for the maximum sentence. Force that bastard to cough up his shares, one way or another."
Not that Kang would ever admit it, but—
His connections in the legal world were overflowing.
Especially since many were tied through family networks, it was no accident people joked about the "Republic of Kang."
Even if that influence wasn't what it used to be.
Some nobody trying to mess with Jin-ho's hobby?
He could crush that bastard without breaking a sweat.
＊＊＊
The KBO was suffering a massive headache over the Rangers scandal.
Embezzlement by a team owner?!
How the hell was that even possible?
For years, fans had joked that the Rangers' shoddy player support and training facilities meant someone was skimming money behind the scenes.
Turns out, it wasn't a joke—it was real.
Now, suspicions about the team's financial transparency were pouring in.
The only silver lining was that other corporate-owned teams were already known to be money-losing ventures, with no real funds to embezzle.
"But Gwangun...?"
"Yes. Gwangun finally succeeded in securing the shares."
"What? How? That weasel of an owner was clinging on for dear life."
KBO Commissioner Jin Gu-hyun had hoped the Rangers would be sold to another team.
But with the arrested owner stubbornly holding out, he'd assumed the deal would collapse—yet somehow, Gwangun pulled it off.
"From what I've heard... the prosecution applied serious pressure."
"The prosecution? Since when does Gwangun have those kinds of connections?"
"No way to know for sure, but they say the prosecution even formed a special task force to dig up additional charges beyond embezzlement—like catching rats in a trap. With the sentence piling up, the guy had no choice but to surrender."
Even someone who's spent their entire life rolling around in the baseball world will hear certain things once they climb to a position like this.
They say the current administration is pushing Gwangun as hard as possible.
But I never imagined the prosecution would step in to help them to this extent.
So this is the power of a major corporation, huh?
"Wait a minute. Then don't tell me the Rangers' owner getting arrested for embezzlement was also..."
"It seems likely Gwangun laid the groundwork in advance to acquire the Rangers. Honestly, aside from the Rangers, acquiring any other team would've been difficult."
"Was the chairman of Gwangun perhaps a Rangers fan?"
"That seems highly probable."
They must've been so furious at how poorly the team was performing that they decided to bulldoze the entire franchise.
So with enough money and connections, even something like this is possible.
But regardless of the process, this was good news for the KBO.
If a corporation invests heavily in a team and raises its quality, viewers will naturally find the games more entertaining.
"Now all that's left is our approval from the KBO..."
"What's there to hesitate about? We'll welcome them with open arms. Besides, they just trampled an entire company to get their hands on a baseball team. You wanna end up like that?"
"Ah, no."
"Then approve it as politely as possible. Tell them we look forward to their future investments."
"Yes, sir."
Baseball.
What a terrifying sport.
Just because the team was underperforming and frustrating to watch, a major corporation swept the entire franchise away to take matters into their own hands.
That greedy owner must've picked the wrong opponent.
＊＊＊
What I thought would be a difficult acquisition process ended up being surprisingly smooth.
For reasons unknown, the sudden, all-out pressure from the prosecution forced the owner to hand over all his shares and wash his hands of the team.
And at a lower price than expected, no less.
"The team is ranked at the very bottom, and everything—facilities, player salaries—is significantly below standard. Still, with a bit of support, we can polish them back up."
The team's condition was worse than I'd thought.
There were repairs needed everywhere, and morale across the team was low.
On top of that, being the worst-ranked team meant players weren't exactly lining up to join.
"But you seem to be in a good mood, Section Chief?"
"Huh? Ah. Well, it's just... I'm feeling a bit strange, you know? It's surreal that the company I work for has acquired the team I root for. I really hope they do well. Our Rangers... no, wait. It's Gwangun Prime now. I hope our Gwangun does really well."
The old name, Rangers, was scrapped, and the team was rebranded as Gwangun Prime.
"Forward all baseball team matters to the Vice Chairman. He'll probably handle them better than I can."
"The Vice Chairman?"
"Ah, you didn't know? He was a Rangers fan too."
"Wow. I thought he never watched baseball."
"Exactly."
Just as I was about to send Hye-rin off to the Vice Chairman with a smile—
"...?"
A sudden jolt of electricity seemed to shoot through my body.
"Wait a second."
"Yes?"
"Let me see those documents you're holding."
"Ah, sure!"
I examined the papers Hye-rin handed me.
Various materials related to the team.
That sensation just now meant there was something here I needed to look into.
Sure enough—
"Draft list?"
"Ah, right. To recruit players, you have to go through the draft. You pick them from this list. Alternatively, you can sign free agents or foreign players separately, depending on the regulations."
In other words, as someone who knows nothing about baseball, these profiles wouldn't tell me who's a good player.
Yet my instincts were reacting intensely to this very list.
Hesitant but curious, I unfolded it.
"...!"
And then, each player's name on the list began glowing in a different color.