Players from Baejae High School's baseball team adjust their caps after bowing before the first round of the 54th Bonghwang National High School Baseball Tournament against Incheon High at Mokdong Baseball Stadium on Aug. 12. Baejae High lost 5-8 to Incheon High that day, ending its season. [Yonhap]
Players from Baejae High School's baseball team adjust their caps after bowing before the first round of the 54th Bonghwang National High School Baseball Tournament against Incheon High at Mokdong Baseball Stadium on Aug. 12. Baejae High lost 5-8 to Incheon High that day, ending its season. [Yonhap]

The Korea Baseball Softball Association has sanctioned several players and the coach of Baejae High School's baseball team over a controversy involving chants that mocked the May 18 pro-democracy movement during a high school tournament.

The association said Wednesday it held its 12th Sports Fairness Committee meeting at the Olympic Hall on Tuesday and voted to impose one-month competition bans on two Baejae High players who led the derogatory chants and on the coach who bore supervisory responsibility.

The association said it weighed several factors in setting the penalty: the team had already received a separate institutional sanction, the players had shown genuine remorse and delivered a sincere apology to the affected school, Gwangju Jeil High, and Gwangju Jeil High had accepted the apology and appealed for leniency.

The controversy began on June 29, when players in the Baejae High dugout shouted chants including "Let's go to Starbucks" and "Tank Day" during a Cheongnyong Tournament game against Gwangju Jeil High.

The chants evoked a marketing controversy involving Starbucks Korea roughly a month earlier, in which the company had been widely criticized for trivializing the May 18 pro-democracy movement. The Baejae High players' use of those references drew accusations of denigrating the democratic uprising and disparaging the Gwangju region.

Starbucks Korea had drawn public backlash for running a tumbler discount promotion on the anniversary of the May 18 pro-democracy movement using the phrases "Tank Day" and "A thud on the desk" — language associated with state violence during the era. The Baejae High players' use of those phrases as chants became the center of the controversy.

As the backlash grew, the Korean Sport & Olympic Committee's Sports Fairness Committee handed Baejae High a six-month ban from national competitions. The ban was later reduced to one month on review after all 36 members of the Baejae High baseball team visited Gwangju Jeil High to apologize in person and paid their respects at the National May 18 Democratic Cemetery, and Gwangju Jeil High accepted the apology and requested leniency.

As a result, Baejae High was able to compete in the Bonghwang National High School Baseball Tournament last month — the final national competition of the season — but lost in the first round, ending its season.

Separately from the disciplinary proceedings, the two Baejae High students who led the chants have decided to quit playing baseball.

The home plate umpire who allowed the game to continue without issuing any sanction at the time also received a one-month competition ban for negligence. A Gwangju Jeil High coach who used abusive and profane language while protesting the chants was issued a reprimand, with mitigating circumstances taken into account.

Korea Baseball Softball Association President Yang Hae-young said it was deeply regrettable that such an incident had occurred in youth baseball and pledged to prevent a recurrence. The association also plans to expand efforts to prohibit inappropriate chants at games and to establish a code of conduct for players that will apply to national competitions starting in 2027.


betterj@heraldcorp.com