Tagged: Chinese Professional baseball league

Welcome to the Scooter Capital of the World


  Scooters in Taipei outside of the Main Station

Many people in the United States when they think of scooters, think about driving one in Key West or Hawaii along the beach and park and drink alcoholic beverages with umbrellas in them. That is the complete opposite thought of scooters over here in Taiwan. Scooters in Taiwan are a way of life. They provide transportation for individuals, families, and supplies. Just when I think I have seen it all over here something new pops up. I have seen 3 people on a 1 and 2 person scooter. I have seen infants as passengers, many elderly drivers, and workers transporting large gas canisters on the back of them. The other day when I thought there was a wreck in the middle of the street, it wasn’t, it was a scooter who had too many cardboard boxes that fell off and made a mess in the intersection.

Scooters seem to always have the right of way when it comes to the road laws. There usually is a designated lane on the right of the road for scooters, but many of them weave in and out of traffic. From speaking with local players, they tell me that cars must give the right of way to all scooters and are liable for any accidents. Driving on these roads with the amount of scooters and cars can be pretty scary. Drivers will just pull out of side streets without looking and expect cars to stop or move out of the way. Scooters will drive on the other side of the road against on coming traffic to get to the traffic light quicker. The hardest part of owning a scooter is trying to find parking for it. There are designated spots for scooters, but with the amount of them here it becomes very tough to park “legally”. If you make your “own” spot, you can be towed and they will mark on the street with chalk where your scooter was towed. Hopefully it doesn’t rain and wash away the chalk or you will never find your scooter.

Luckily with all of the traffic and aggressive driving scooter drivers must wear helmets.

Big congratulations to Yo-Yo from the Lamigo Monkeys for winning the Homerun Derby during the All-Star game.

Our manager gave us Friday and Saturday off for the All Star break. Just got home from our Sunday workout with the minor league team. Day off tomorrow then practice Tuesday and games Thursday through Sunday. Come check us out. We will be in Taichung for most of the week.

Probably headed back into Taipei tomorrow. Yesterday I checked out the night market in Shilin off the MRT red line. The food there looked delicious and smelled amazing. The fruits were so colorful and fresh. I just need some help identifying what everything is. Also if you see me or one of the other imports in the streets, come up to us and say hi. We love interacting with local fans and will sign an autograph or take a picture. I noticed some people starring at me the other day on the MRT. I don’t bite, I’m friendly.

Thanks as always for reading and sharing my blog with others. Thanks to my Taiwanese fans for translating my blog and posting it in your forums.

PS – There was a lot of talk about my comments last week about the all-star game voting and I think it got lost in translation. In no way was I disrespecting the player or envious of him. It was only my outlook of how the voting for the all star game worked. I found it interesting that only the fans vote, and not the managers, players, or media.

Please comment and leave feedback.

For my US fans, here is the link to my statistics. I know it can be tough to find them online or even understand them.

So far 39.1 inns 2.74 ERA 22k’s 9 bb     http://www.cpbl.com.tw/personal_Rec/pbat_personal.aspx?Pno=A0B2&Gno=01&Role=2&pbatpage=1

Due to the rain we were forced to practice indoors. Literally indoors taking ground balls on a marble floor and getting treatment on top of our ice cooler.

Im no special photographer, but I love this pic

  View from the High Speed Rail heading to Taipei

  I love the Panda Jeremy Scott Adidas shoes! I’m jealous Taiwan and Asia gets so many special sneaker releases. If anyone owns a sneaker store or has friends who do, please contact me. I’m a huge sneaker collector and would love to get in contact with more people in Taiwan.

Don’t forget to screw in your cleats!


Last night prior to my start in Tainan against the Lions (sorry had the Elephants before made the correction now), I’m about to warm up on the field and noticed something is wrong with one of my cleats. I look down and see that my metal spikes are about to come off. For those of you who don’t know many Asian type cleats are interchangeable and have screws and metal plates with the cleats on them. My cleat was missing two screws and the metal frame was dangling. I guess I didn’t realize after each start you should tighten up the screws because they can come loose. This all happened 20 minutes before the game. I scrambled around the locker room looking for someone who one had the special tool to unscrew them or some extra screws. Luckily, our equipment manager Ashton found the tool. Unfortunately, that was all that he found. I had to now remove the middle cleat plate from both shoes to be worn evenly. This was extremely awkward at first when I started to jog and get loose, but I guess it could have been worse.

The game wasn’t one of my better games. We lost 4-3 and I threw 5.1 innings. I left the game tied at 2. The most amazing part of the game was the rain delay. As typhoon type rain came down in the top of the 8th inning, the field crew runs on the field and covers the mound and home plate. I then noticed them putting 10 x 10 foot tarps over each base individually. I turn to Steve Hammond and ask where is the big tarp to cover everything. He replies you are looking at them.  I only wish I was able to get video or pictures of the amount of rain that came down and was sitting on the field. I honestly would have bet $100 that there was no chance we could play especially after an hour of non stop rain and with the baselines, second base, short stop, and third base completely exposed. After the rain stopped about 30 kids ran onto the field with sponges and soaked up the field. I laughed a bit seeing these guys with small sponges trying to work, because there was so much water. I have to give it to them though, they worked very hard and somehow we got the rest of the game in.

Notes from the week

– Reminder you can not hit a batter who has hit a homerun in that game. If you do you are ejected. That happen to one of our guys last week. Worst part was it was on a bad slider in which he lost control of it. But rules are rules I guess.

– If you hit a batter in the head you are ejected. This happened last night with our pitcher. I believe the hitter is doing fine and sustained no serious injuries.

– With all of these pitcher ejections, I don’t think you have to leave the dugout or get fined.

– The All-Star game is this weekend in Kaohsiung. The entire team is based on fan votes. There is some starter going with a 5.50 ERA and a losing record. But must be a fan favorite.

– A lot of friends have asked me about some of the equipment out here. The best place to get custom gloves, arm guards, and leg guards is http://www.taiwanbaseball.com.tw/  Ask for my friend Derick. They are extremely professional and the workmanship of the gloves is the best. You can pretty much customize any part of the glove. They ship worldwide.

Thanks for reading and sharing my blog. Thank you to my USA followers and new Taiwanese followers. I hope that I am still keeping you entertained and ask that you please leave comments, questions, or suggestions. I love reading your feedback.

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