A 21-year wait continues: Online ticketing leaves LG's oldest fans in the cold

Getting a ticket to the Korean Series has become a fierce competition as seats sell out within seconds online. High-tech ticketing has alienated older fans of the LG Twins who have been turned away from full stadiums on game day in-person.

LG Twins fans pack Jamsil Baseball Stadium in southern Seoul on Tuesday for the first game of the Korean Series, which the Seoul team has not won since 1994. [YONHAP]

Fans of the LG Twins have waited 21 years for this moment, longer than some of them have even been alive. The OG Seoul team are in the Korean Series for the first time since 2002, when they lost 4-2 to the Samsung Lions in Daegu.

For some, that was literally a lifetime ago. It was the year Korea became the hosts of the World Cup and Korean fans saw the national team make it to the semifinals for the very first time. In 2003, SK would purchase Cyworld — then a popular social network that has long since died. Samsung would graduate from flip phones and debut the Galaxy in 2009.

This year’s pennant-winning team has not earned the League title since they defeated the Pacific Dolphins — later the Hyundai Unicorns and now nothing but history — in 1994, enduring the second-longest drought of all the teams in the KBO. The Twins have been winless for the majority of their existence.

The League celebrated its 40th birthday last year, along with some of its first-ever fans. What began as six teams in 1982 has become Korea’s most popular sports franchise. Now, getting a seat to watch the playoffs live has become nearly impossible as tickets sell out within seconds online.

These online ticket sales have alienated older fans, reports Korean broadcaster JTBC, an affiliate of the Korea JoongAng Daily.

They are the OG LG fans who might remember the team's first-ever win with Baek In-chul in 1990 or the bitter loss of 2002. They've been onboard since the team's logo was a rather fetching bat-swinging dragon and MBC was paying the bills, and could tell you about how the team emerged from an 11-year hole in the postseason to a near-comeback in 2013, until the Twins were knocked out by Seoul rivals Doosan Bears in the playoffs.

But online ticket sales are making it nearly impossible for older fans to book a seat to watch their home team in the Korean Series, arriving on game day to a sold out stadium.

Tickets for Game 1 of the Korean Series were sold out online. [SCREEN CAPTURE]

“Since everything is sold 100 percent online, it means that people like me who are in their 70s can't buy it. I have been a (fan) since MBC Chungryong, but I cannot enter,” Choi Ji-nam told JTBC in an interview outside of the stadium.

The camera follows another elderly man, donning a Twins’ cap, who approaches the ticket counter.

“Sorry, we're sold out today,” the ticket clerk says.

“Everywhere? Even the outfield? Don't you have any?” The man says.

“Sorry, we're sold out today.”

He walks away.

It’s a major loss. For anyone who can appreciate the game of baseball, there is arguably no better place than Korea to watch the sport live. Attending a KBO game for the first time is like a sort of baptism. It’s a different world inside Jamsil or Sajik or KT Wiz Park.

Fans pack Jamsil Baseball Stadium in southern Seoul for Game 1 of the 2023 Korean Series between the LG Twins and the KT Wiz on Tuesday. [YONHAP]

The struggle for Twins’ oldest fans to watch them in a historic series mirrors a greater challenge for elderly people nationwide, as Korean transportation and banking systems have moved nearly everything online.

Korean theater chain CGV announced it would broadcast the Korean Series live at 10 cinemas in the greater Seoul area. Even then, nine theaters are in Twins’ territory Seoul and just one in Suwon, home of the KT Wiz.

The Korean Series is tied 1-1, with the KT Wiz winning the opener 3-2 and the Twins picking up the second 5-4. The Twins next face the Wiz in Game 3 on Friday in Suwon at 6:30 p.m. local time.

BY MARY YANG AND JIM BULLEY [mary.yang@joongang.co.kr]