Youth Baseball in Taiwan:

From fun to a sense of responsibility

Kao-Yuan Vocational High School of Technology and Commerce, located in Kaohsiung, has long been a powerhouse in Southern Taiwan, producing players who have played overseas or starred in the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL), such as Tsao Chin-hui and Chen Wei-yin. Every year it draws junior high school players who are willing to leave their homes to pursue their dreams.

In August 2026, Kao-Yuan represented Taiwan in the Babe Ruth League 16U World Series for kids aged 13 to 16, held in the US. They finished as the runner up, the best performance ever by a team from Taiwan. Team captain Huang Yuchen recalls that despite being nervous when facing the strapping American players, “I just wanted to win.” Meanwhile, coach Ken Mayumura says that their journey opened the players’ eyes to the world and spurred their competitiveness.

Retired CPBL professional Wang Tzu-sung, now a coach for Kao-Yuan, notes that high school is an important watershed in everyone’s baseball career, when players must determine for themselves whether they can make a lifelong career out of baseball. Senior (18U) captain Li Zhenzhi tells us that when he was small, he played baseball just for fun, and it was only after arriving in high school that he came to understand his responsibility to “make the most out of every day.”

Beside teaching young people baseball, coaches also guide players toward careers as umpires, official scorers, support staff, and sports science professionals. In addition, teams pay close attention to players’ behavior and deportment, building discipline by having all players live at their schools and helping these soon-to-be-adult youngsters figure out how to prepare for the future.

Kao-Yuan’s second campus, in Kaohsiung’s Qiaotou District, has its own baseball field and indoor batting practice facility.

Eleventh grader Yang Yaocheng was named top hitter at this year’s Puzi Mayor’s Cup National Baseball Tournament. He always demands all-out effort from himself when working out and often takes extra practice on his own initiative.

From club to national contender

Meanwhile, at National Lotung Industrial Vocational High School in Luodong, Yilan County, baseball used to be basically a club activity, but after getting support from the Lin Teng Cultural and Educational Foundation, they formed a school team which produced CPBL players two years in a row. Moreover, in the 2025 Black Panther Cup High School Baseball Championship, sponsored by CTBC Bank, they took second place as a dark horse team, the best finish ever for a team from Yilan.

Manager He Yude, who has been leading the team for eight years, has not only witnessed the squad’s spectacular transformation, he has changed his own instructional style. The old model of training players through scolding and physical punishment has fallen out of favor, so he now takes a kinder, gentler approach, and has learned to first breathe deeply for 30 seconds before responding when a player makes a mistake.

He divides the players into small training groups to encourage healthy competition and has cut back on whole-team practices, giving them more time to train independently. “If a player is only practicing because you demand it, he might only do 30 repetitions, but if they are doing it because they want to, they will do 70 or 80 reps, without the coach having to come down hard.”

Kao-Yuan players on a training run through the nearby Wulilin community. In front is senior captain Li Zhenzhi.

Players practice fielding ground balls and making throws.

This August Kao-Yuan represented Taiwan at the 2026 Babe Ruth League 16U World Series for kids aged 13–16. They came in second, the best finish ever in that event for a team from Taiwan. (courtesy of Kao-Yuan Vocational High School of Technology and Commerce)

This year, coach Ken Mayumura took the Kao-Yuan team to compete in a tournament in the US. He says that for many of the kids it was their first time getting a passport and going abroad. Watching them transcend the language barrier and make friends with foreign players through gestures, he felt amazed and gratified.

Victory vs. growth

Given frequent games, how can teams balance “winning” with “helping players grow”? He Yude says that in recent years athlete welfare has been given greater prominence, with measures such as pitch-count limits and mandatory rest periods, enabling players to remain healthy as they move into the adult ranks. These days one rarely sees teams “burning out” their top pitchers.

In addition, baseball teams now cooperate with sports science experts using hi-tech equipment to regularly track pitchers’ pitches and collect information on aspects such as spin rates, while batters get detailed data on things like their “attack angle” (swing angle). Such information helps players refine their technique.

Lotung manager He Yude retired from his role as a power hitter in amateur adult baseball at age 28, then returned home to Yilan to take charge of the team.

The National Lotung Industrial Vocational High School baseball team, founded in 1998, absorbed the disbanded team from Chung Dau K-12 School in 2019. With corporate support, the Lotung squad transferred to Taiwan’s top baseball division (the Wood Bat Division), becoming Yilan County’s only high-school team in that category. They train at the baseball field in scenic Luodong Sports Park.

The Lotung baseball team has adopted a model of “practicing by the day, studying by night.” The team encourages players to cultivate a second skill, to prepare themselves for all future career possibilities.

Not just cultivating stars

The value of youth baseball does not lie only in training future professional players. Kao-Yuan’s Wang Tzu-sung hopes that team members will remember their playing days after they graduate. “When someone asks you where you went to high school, you should feel proud to tell them Kao-Yuan Vocational High.”

Chiu Yu-cheng, who became an assistant coach after graduating from Lotung, encourages younger schoolmates: “You train hard every day for that one moment on the field. Leave no room for regret.”

Over the three years of high school, players’ techniques and bodies are steadily maturing and it is also the time when they begin to think about the future. Some will go on to continue to chase their baseball dreams, while others will leave the field and take other pathways through life. But the courage, self-discipline, stress resistance, and team spirit learned on the diamond will stay with them for a long time—even for the rest of their lives.

After practice, He Yude not only assesses the practice with the team, he also emphasizes comportment and manners by reminding the players to develop everyday habits like returning things to their proper places.

Chiu Yu-cheng, who transitioned this year from player to assistant coach, last year led the Lotung team to a dark-horse second-place finish in the CTBC 2025 Black Panther Cup High School Baseball Championship, and was named best catcher of the tournament.

Lotung’s original goal was to make it to the quarterfinals of the 2025 Black Panther Cup Championship. But they defeated one strong opponent after another and unexpectedly finished second, the best result in team history. (courtesy of National Lotung Industrial Vocational High School)