KBL considers introducing off-season exhibition games... Cup tournaments are likely to disappear

KBL considers introducing off-season exhibition games... Cup tournaments are likely to disappear

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This year, the Cup, the prelude to the regular season of professional basketball, is not expected to be held.토토사이트

This is because KBL has decided to replace the cup tournament with an exhibition game, which has low crowd mobilization power, amid the tight schedule due to the advancement of the opening.

According to the basketball community on the 10th, after recent internal discussions, the KBL tentatively concluded that the Cup will not be held in the 2025-2026 season.

Unlike previous years, when the league started in mid-October, the opening was pushed to early October this year, which was the starting point of this change.

After receiving complaints that the league schedule was tight from 10 teams, the KBL decided to increase the opening time by increasing the interval between the game days. If this happens, the timing of the league and the Cup will coincide with each other. All of the cup competitions for the past three years were held in early October.

Accordingly, KBL seems to have decided not to hold a cup competition at all, but to hold an exhibition game where clubs can flexibly match their schedules.

A KBL official said, "There is no schedule to hold the Cup this year. While looking for an alternative to enjoying off-season basketball, we decided to consider an exhibition game method in which we can focus more on our fans in our hometown."

The Cup was first introduced in 2020 to quench the thirst of fans who are hungry for basketball even in the off-season and was held for five consecutive years until last year.

However, the crowd mobilization was not high due to the hard work of visiting each region where the competition was held to enjoy the cup on site.

Only 1,279 spectators visited Jecheon Gymnasium, the final site of last year's cup competition, when Wonju DB beat Suwon kt 77-67. Cup competitions have been held not only in Jecheon, but also in areas not home to professional basketball clubs such as Tongyeong and Sangju.

For the club, the cup tournament had positive effects, such as checking breathing with foreign players and raising the players' physical condition, but there was also a disadvantage that they could not play enough games if they were eliminated early because it was a tournament.

If it is an exhibition game, the number of games is guaranteed to be stable, and there is no need to stick to winning like when playing in the tournament, so there is an advantage of checking the team in various ways and flexibility.

If the exhibition game is stable and produces the expected effect, the KBL Cup is expected to disappear.

In the history of professional basketball, exhibition games and cup competitions have alternately been responsible for the offseason. The exhibition game was introduced in 1997, the first year, but it was suspended after the 1999-2000 season due to growing voices from the field complaining of the burden of physical strength.

However, the public opinion that professional basketball should be promoted even in the offseason increased, and the exhibition games were held from 2003-2004 to 2011-2012 season.

Since 2012, the exhibition game has disappeared again as both professional and amateur teams have started the strongest professional-amateur competition in the cup competition, and changes are expected again this year.