Kia Tigers win the Korean sports team popularity contest

The Kia Tigers were the most popular professional sports club in Korea this year, pulling in over 2.7 million fans as baseball proved to be the most popular sport in the country.

The Kia Tigers celebrate after coming back to beat the LG Twins 4-3 at Gwangju-Kia Champions Field in Gwangju on Oct. 6. [YONHAP]

The Kia Tigers were the most popular professional sports club in Korea this year, pulling in over 2.7 million fans as baseball proved to be the most popular sport in the country.

A total of six KBO clubs landed in the top 10 most popular teams this year, alongside two K League clubs and two V League clubs. A number of basketball teams and even an Esports team made it in to the top 20.

The ranking of the most popular sports teams in Korea was released by data analysis company TLOG using a mixture of television and portal website views and a survey of 1,000 people nationwide aged 18 or over. Figures were based on the 2022 season for most sports, while for basketball and volleyball, which straddle two years, the figures come from the 2021-22 season.

According to the study the Kia Tigers have 2.78 million fans, with 58 percent being male and 42 percent female. The Tigers also had the highest number of fans that identified as “fanatics,” with 1.55 million fans saying they are die-hard fans.

The Tigers finished the 2022 KBO season in fifth place but were unable to make it out of the Wildcard spot to get a taste of the postseason proper.

Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors's Cho Gue-sung, right, celebrates after scoring the club's second goal in a 3-1 victory over FC Seoul on Oct. 30 in the second leg of the FA Cup finals. Jeonbuk beat FC Seoul to the trophy on a 5-3 aggregate score. [YONHAP]

K League 1 club Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors came second with a total of 2.34 million fans, 70 percent of whom are male. Of those, 840,000 claim to be fanatics.

Jeonbuk forward and 2022 K League top-scorer Cho Gue-sung was the star of the club this year, playing some incredible football in the domestic league in the 2022 season.

Cho scored 17 goals and marked five assists in his 31 matches this season, becoming the highest scorer. He was named the FA Cup MVP after scoring three of the eight goals in both legs of the FA Cup finals.

Cho recently channeled that success into the Qatar World Cup, where he scored two of Korea’s four goals and earned himself a huge global following. If Cho does return to Jeonbuk next season, that fan number is likely to see a significant boost.

KBO clubs took the third and fourth spots. Samsung Lions came third with a total of 2.3 million fans and the Doosan Bears followed with 2.16 million fans. Despite their popularity, neither club made it to the playoffs this season.

Kim Yeon-koung of the Incheon Heungkuk Life Pink Spiders reacts during a match against the Seoul GS Caltex at Samsan World Gymnasium in Incheon on Tuesday. [YONHAP]

The Incheon Heungkuk Life Pink Spiders volleyball team tied with the Bears at fourth and were the top women’s club on the ranking with 2.16 million fans. The Pink Spiders are the only women’s professional sports club in the top 10 and have the highest ratio of female fans, at 47 percent.

With volleyball numbers based on the 2021-22 season, the Pink Spiders pulled in those fans without international star and former national team captain Kim Youn-koung, who returned to the club for the 2022-23 season, but played last season in China.

A flurry of KBO clubs followed, with the LG Twins in sixth with 2.12 million fans, the Lotte Giants seventh with 1.99 million fans and the Hanwha Eagles eight with 1.15 million.

K League 1 club FC Seoul landed ninth with 1.68 million fans, with men’s volleyball club Samsung Fire Insurance Bluefangs at No. 10 with 1.63 million fans.

Lee ″Faker″ Sang-hyeok poses for a picture at the LoL Park in central Seoul on Sep. 17, 2018. [NEWS1]

Esports team T1, home of talismanic star Faker, came in at No. 11 with 1.55 million fans. Despite being the only Esports team to make the list, T1 had an unusually large number of fanatics.

If you look at each sport separately, the KBO is not only the most popular league in terms of fans, but also has the most self-proclaimed fanatics. The six KBO clubs in the top 10 clubs with the most fans are also the six clubs with the most die-hard fans.

The Kia Tigers' Kim Ki-hoon heads to the dugout during a game between the Kia Tigers and LG Twins at Gwangju-Kia Champions Field in Gwangju on Oct. 6. [YONHAP]

Kia has the most fanatics at 1.55 million, with the Lions and Giants tied for second with 1.19 million. The Eagles are third with 1.15 million, the Bears fourth with 1.02 million and the Twins fifth with 0.97 million.

But when you look at the proportion of fanatics as a percentage of the fan base, the Giants stand out in front with 59 percent of their fans claiming to be fanatical about the team. The club with the second highest share of die-hard fans was the Eagles, at 57 percent, and the third highest was the Tigers, at 55.7 percent.

For both the Giants and the Eagles, those percentages fit with the general image of the teams. The Giants have for years claimed to have the most passionate fans in Korea, and according to the study results, the fans clearly think so as well. The Eagles have been the perennial bottom feeders in the KBO for more than a decade, so their fans need a fair amount of fanaticism to keep coming back.

While there are two K League clubs in the top 10, their fans tend to be less invested, with only 35 percent of Jeonbuk fans and 26 percent of FC Seoul fans identifying as fanatics.

Reigning champions Ulsan Hyundai are ranked at No. 13 with 1.24 million fans, just 400,000 of whom claim to be fanatics, and Suwon Samsung Bluewings come in at No. 20 with 0.88 million fans, 440,000 of whom are die-hard supporters.

Park Ji-su plays the ball on Monday against Incheon Shinhan Bank S-Birds at Cheongju Gymnasium in Cheongju, North Chungcheong. [WKBL]

Of the top 20 popular clubs, four are women’s teams. Two are from the women’s volleyball league, with the Pink Spiders at No. 4 and the IBK Altos ranked at No. 14 with 1.1 million fans. The other two are women’s basketball teams, with the KB Stars at No. 15 with 1.05 million fans and the Woori Bank WooriWON at No. 17 with 1.02 million fans.

The popularity of the women’s sport clubs is growing thanks to star players like the women's national volleyball team and Park Ji-su of the KB Stars.

More than 60 percent of sports fans watched matches on TV, with the exception of League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK), which has a particularly young fanbase. LCK was watched more on streaming platforms, at 53 percent, with just 26 percent watching on TV.

BY KIM HYO-KYUNG, YUN SO-HYANG [yun.sohyang@joongang.co.kr]