It's the ABL's Asian explosion that has the Canberra Cavalry going into two million Korean homes this weekend, with the league hopeful those AFL-esque numbers could continue to grow into Japan and Taiwan.
The Cavalry are locked in the middle of a four-game series against Geelong-Korea at Narrabundah Ballpark – an ABL expansion team of Korean players based in Victoria for the season.
The Canberra Cavalry’s series against Geelong-Korea will be watched by two million people.Credit:SMP Images/Brett Fewson
While Geelong-Korea are still finding their feet on the ballpark – they'd only won four games going into the Cavalry series – they've certainly found an audience back home.
MBC Sports+ is televising every game with initial figures indicating audiences in excess of 500,000 per game.
That means the Cavalry will be watched by more than two million viewers across the series.
They're figures ABL chief executive Cam Vale was hopeful of achieving, but he's been blown away by nonetheless.
"Between 500,000-600,000 people are tuning in through mainly MBC [Sports+], but also through their social media platform Naver," he said.
"So over a series you're getting close to two million people would be expected to watch this series between Canberra and Geelong-Korea.
"We were hopeful of those numbers and they were realistic that they could be reached, and possibly more, but you also know it's such a leap from where we were at.
"To have those sort of numbers put us into AFL and Big Bash realm if that was an Australian number.
"We're both pleasantly surprised, but still a little bit in shock that it's actually working."
Vale was hopeful they could achieve similar results through further expansion into Japan and Taiwan, with games already televised in Taiwan through Eleven Sports.
While the ABL gets limited coverage from Fox Sports in Australia, their ties with Asia could prove a boon as well as a point of difference.
The Cavalry have a partnership with Nippon Professional Baseball team Yokohama DeNA Baystars, with four players currently on their roster.
"The whole expansion into Asia was about diversifying the league and creating something different on-field, but the return on the field was hopefully going to be the eye balls out of Korea, which seems to be going quite well," Vales said.
"The future growth of it gives us mind-blowing 'I wonder where this could get to over time'.
"For us if we can expand with a similar concept with a Taiwanese and a Japanese team, all of a sudden our so-called niche Australian Baseball League becomes a serious product for viewership in this part of the world."
ABL ROUND SIX
Canberra Cavalry v Geelong-Korea at Narrabundah Ballpark, Saturday 7pm and Sunday 1pm.
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