Marking its 45th anniversary, South Korean professional baseball opened the 2026 season with strong turnout from the first day.
The KBO League said 105,878 fans attended the season openers held March 28 at five ballparks nationwide. It was the third-largest opening-day total on record, behind 2019 (114,021) and 2025 (109,950).
All five stadiums sold out. The first sellout came at Incheon SSG Landers Field for the KIA Tigers-SSG Landers game, where all 23,000 seats were gone by 10 a.m. The Daejeon game between the Kiwoom Heroes and Hanwha Eagles also sold out about two hours before first pitch.
Sellouts followed at Jamsil for kt wiz-LG Twins, in Daegu for the Lotte Giants-Samsung Lions game, and in Changwon for Doosan Bears-NC Dinos.
The league has now recorded sellouts at all opening-day venues for four straight years. After topping 10 million in total attendance in back-to-back seasons — about 10.88 million in 2024 and about 12.31 million in 2025 — the KBO is on track to reach the mark for a third consecutive year.
Before the season began, exhibition games drew more than 440,000 fans, setting a record and adding to expectations for strong interest this year.
* This article has been translated by AI.
Copyright ⓒ Aju Press All rights reserved.