ABSTRACT
Case Summary The Korean Baseball League (KBL) is the oldest, and still the leading, professional sports league in South Korea after 25 years. Despite its beginnings being motivated by the then militant government of the 1980s, the KBL has enjoyed duopolistic status in the sports market, alongside the soccer K-League which was founded in the following year. However, in the mid-1990s, the KBL was affected by a boom in interest due to the success of Korean baseball players in foreign leagues, in growing interest in US Major League Baseball (MLB) and the promotion of football by the South Korean government prior to the 2002 FIFA World Cup.
