The Chinatrust Whales (中信鯨), formerly Koos Group Whales (和信鯨), were a Taiwanese professional baseball team. Founded as an amateur team in 1991, this club became professional and joined the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) in 1997. It was administered by the Chinatrust Financial Holding Company. The Whales never won a CPBL championship during its existence. On 11 November 2008, it was announced that the team would disband due to financial losses of the Chinatrust group.
History In 1997, the amateur Chinatrust Whales Baseball Team was professionalized and became the seventh member of Chinese Professional Baseball League; however, because Taiwan forbids financial institutions to invest in unrelated markets, the ownership of the team had to be transferred to Koos Group (和信集團), which was also the owner of Chinatrust, thus the team was named KG Whales when it began its first season.
Initially, the Whales played their home games at the Chiayi Baseball Field. The team did not have any notable success over the course of its history, with only two appearances in the Championship series, winning only a single game over the course of those two series while dropping eight. In 2002, because of the split of Chinatrust and the Koos Group, the ownership of the Whales were transferred back to Chinatrust and renamed Chinatrust Whales. The organization disbanded after the 2008 season.
Although owned by the same parent corporation, Chinatrust Whales and Chinatrust Brothers are two separate organization with separate franchise histories. Chinatrust acquired the Brothers organization from Brother Hotel in December 2013, five years after the Whales folded.
Final roster
Records Qualified for PlayoffsTaiwan Series ChampionshipAsia Series Championship
Regular seasons Season WinsLossesTiesPct.Place Koos Group Whales 1997 39 (20/19) 56 (27/29) 1 (1/0) .411 (.426/.396) 7 (6/6) 1998 54 49 2 .524 4 1999 60 29 2 .674 1 2000 41 (21/20) 45 (21/24) 4 (3/1) .477 (.500/.455) 3 (2/3) 2001 45 (23/22) 45 (22/23) 0 (0/0) .500 (.511/.489) 3 (2/2) Chinatrust Whales 2002 45 (21/24) 42 (21/21) 3 (3/0) .517 (.500/.533) 2 (2/2) 2003 51 (26/25) 43 (19/24) 6 (5/1) .543 (.578/.510) 4 (2/4) 2004 45 (21/24) 50 (27/23) 5 (2/3) .474 (.438/.511) 4 (5/4) 2005 47 (24/23) 49 (24/25) 4 (2/2) .490 (.500/.479) 4 (4/4) 2006 42 (17/25) 51 (31/20) 7 (2/5) .452 (.354/.556) 5 (6/2) 2007 46 (19/27) 52 (30/22) 2 (1/1) .469 (.388/.551) 4 (6/3) 2008 39 (20/19) 61 (30/31) 0 (0/0) .390 (.400/.380) 5 (5/4) Totals 554 572 36 .492 --
Playoffs
Season First Round Taiwan Series Opponent Wins Losses Opponent Wins Losses Koos Group Whales 1999 No first round. Wei Chuan Dragons 1 4 Chinatrust Whales 2002 No first round. Brother Elephants 0 4 TotalCombining the first round and Taiwan Series 1 8
External links The Chinatrust Financial Holding Company official website The CPBL official website