College baseball with an employment rate of less than 5%; How to survive on your own?
College baseball with an employment rate of less than 5%; How to survive on your own?
Blog Article
In the 2025 KBO Rookie Draft held on September 11, 110 prospects were nominated and wore professional uniforms. The fact that only 16 players were scheduled to graduate from college was a big shock.
This can be interpreted in two ways. One is that because there were quite a lot of high school baseball talents this year, there was no situation to select players who will graduate from college. Another is that there is a possibility that college graduates may have fallen in terms of skills than high school graduates.
According to these two factors, college baseball, which does not receive much attention from the public, has not received much attention even in professional baseball.
Accordingly, on the 2nd, four-year university baseball managers held a supervisor meeting in Daejeon to discuss ways to reform and urged cooperation between KBO and the Korea Baseball Softball Association.
In fact, the existence of the KUSF (Korean University Sports Council) has led university sports, including baseball, to move away from the public interest. KUSF has expressed its intention that it cannot produce any commercial content in this regard because it has the commercial rights of all competitions it organizes. In other words, it means that only they can produce content that can be "money" in university sports. Major competitions that were once broadcast on public television and cable TV (college baseball king games, etc.) are now difficult to find on scalpel media.
Therefore, university baseball should find a direction of development in three aspects. The government should first solve the problem of constructing a "Korean-style university baseball model" based on this.
The first is to provide support to players who are seeking to become professionals. For those who have displayed outstanding performances in college baseball, such as Joo Seung-woo (Kium), they should actively help them become professionals while providing them with systematic training and pitching models until they join the pro league.
The second method is to acquire leadership qualifications early on. Given the nature of athletes who retire in their 40s when members of the general society are engaged in economic activities, it is essential to acquire leadership qualifications in order to continue their relationship with baseball. As a result, they can acquire a certificate in their first and second years of university so that they can prepare to become leaders even after the university is unknown.
The third method is to apply for the same course as general college students who can obtain credits in parallel with study and exercise. It can naturally induce challenges in new fields other than baseball, and can join a general company or try new fields such as trainers through degree acquisition.
For example, Seo Sang-ho (a graduate of Sungkyunkwan University), a graduate of Daegu High School who received the MVP award in the presidential cup and the Bonghwangdaegi, entered graduate school immediately after not being nominated as a professional despite his high school and college performances, and is preparing for his second life as a trainer. Cha Jung-hwan, director of Gyeongsang Middle School, also has experience in becoming a leader after serving as a physical education teacher after obtaining a graduate degree. 메이저놀이터
In order for college baseball to have self-sustaining power like this, it is necessary to create a 'three-stage development model' that can help them explore various career paths other than baseball. In particular, in the last draft, the professional scout team shared a common denominator that they selected the desired candidate based on the player's ability, not the university's name value. Therefore, it should be borne in mind that there may be a variety of ways for players from college application to graduation.