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Last year’s Northern League runner-up Dalian finished atop the standings in 2024 at 100-62. That was the best record for all of Chinese League Baseball as the Gold Dragons allowed the fewest runs at 402. 2022’s NL champ Urumqi was second at 95-67, getting back to the playoffs after missing the cut in 2023. Nanjing also was back after missing in 2023 by taking third at 93-69. The Nuggets earned their fifth playoff appearance in seven years.

Reigning China Series winner Tianjin got the fourth and final playoff spot at 91-71, growing their postseason streak to three years. The Jackrabbits edged out Changchun (87-75) and Jinan (85-77) for the final slot. Qingdao led all teams in scoring with 597 runs, but allowed the most in the NL (589). Thus the Devils went 80-82, failing to earn a third straight wild card.

Nanjing 1B Houzhi Ding won Northern League MVP and posted only the eighth Triple Crown season by a CLB hitter. The 26-year old lefty led in homers (63), RBI (119), total bases (405), triple slash (.319/.388/.702), runs (104), hits (184), OPS (1.090), wRC+ (255), and WAR (12.8). Ding became the fourth CLB slugger to hit 60+ dingers in a season and posted the fourth-most total bases to that point.

Pitcher of the Year was Len Goh in his lone season for Dalian. He had won the award in 2021 with Shijiazhuang, where Goh played his first 11 seasons. 2024 was the last year of his deal with the Serpents and they traded him and $47,030,000 in the offseason to the Gold Dragons for two prospects.

Goh won his second ERA title (1.64) and led in WHIP (0.68) and K/BB (17.3) in 2024 for Dalian. The 32-year old Hongkonger added a 13-9 record over 219 innings, 242 strikeouts, 169 ERA+, and 7.9 WAR. It was Goh’s final season in China, as he’d sign in the offseason with MLB’s Oakland Owls at $73,200,000 over four years,

Urumqi fared the best in the double round robin at 4-2, while Nanjing and Dalian were both 3-3 and Tianjin was 2-4. The tiebreaker favored the Nuggets over the Gold Dragons for their third semifinal trip in four years. Their last appearance in 2022 saw a defeat to the Unicorns despite Nanjing being the top seed. Urumqi had homefield this time and again was the victory, winning 4-2 to secure their second trip to the China Series.



Seven teams were realistically in the playoff mix in the Southern League. Xiamen again finished atop the standings, although they fell from 107-55 in 2023 down to 97-65. Still, last year’s SL runner-up Mutts allowed the fewest runs at 414. Tying for second at 94-68 were defending SL champ Guangzhou and Wenzhou. The Gamecocks earned their third playoff spot in four years, while the Wild ended a four-year drought. Guangzhou led the league in scoring with 590 runs.

For the final spot, there was a three-way tie at 89-73 between Shantou, Chongqing, and Macau. Changsha at 85-77 faded down the stretch. The Scorpions won tiebreaker games over both the Cavaliers and Magicians to advance, ending a three-year playoff drought. Meanwhile both Foshan (75-87) and Hong Kong (71-91) struggled in 2024, which ended a six-year playoff streak by both teams.

Kunming was largely irrelevant at 75-87, but they had the Southern League’s MVP in Shimin Loy. The fourth-year second baseman led in the triple slash (.321/.360/.619), OPS (.979), wRC+ (226), and WAR (12.5). Loy added 91 runs, 40 homers, 22 doubles, 11 triples, and 95 RBI. He was living up to the billing as the #1 overall draft pick in 2020. After the 2026 season, the Muscle extended Loy at eight years and $143,500,000.

Another impressive up-and-comer was Chengdu’s Zhiyang Zhuang, who won Pitcher of the Year in his second season. He was one win shy of a Triple Crown with a 1.44 ERA over 249.1 innings, 349 strikeouts, and 17-9 record. Zhuang also led in WHIP (0.75), complete games (18), shutouts (7), and WAR (9.2) with a 190 ERA+. Zhuang was also a #1 overall draft pick, selected in 2022 by the Clowns.

Shantou carried the momentum from their play-in game wins with a rare round robin sweep at 6-0 for their second-ever semifinal appearance (2014, 2016, 2024). Top seed Xiamen at 4-2 earned a repeat semifinal berth, while Guangzhou and Wenzhou both finished 1-5. The Scorpions kept rolling, stinging the Mutts 4-1 in the semifinal. Shantou secured its second-ever trip to the China Series (2014) while Xiamen was left holding the bag again despite their #1 seed.



The 55^th China Series was the first to pit two teams from the 2009 expansion against each other. It was also the first since 2016 to use all seven games, as there had been a long run of lopsided series. Urumqi outlasted Shantou 4-3 to earn their first title. RF Yang Shao won finals MVP in his second season for the Unicorns. The 27-year old RF started 19 playoff games with 15 hits, 7 runs, 3 doubles, 1 homer, 4 RBI, and 6 walks. Urumqi became the 21^st of CLB’s 30 teams to win it all.



Other notes: After 11 years with Shijiazhuang, the Serpents were sellers and traded Cheng Kang to Guangzhou for 2024. It was the final CLB season for the 35-year old slugger, as he’d spent the next six seasons in the Oceania Baseball Association. In his final run in China though, Kang became CLB’s all-time leader in both home runs and RBI.

Kang hit 28 homers with 73 RBI in 2024, giving him 552 dingers and 1272 RBI. He passed Boyu Long’s 537 homers and 1238 RBI to take first place with Long having retired the prior year. Kang also left was the third-most WAR among position players (137.1) and was fourth in runs (1140) and sixth in hits (2210). Kang remained the homer and RBI leader until Tao Cai passed him for both in 2032.

Wenzhou’s Xiaotian Shu set a playoff OPS record at 1.593 (20 plate appearances required). In six games, Shu had 11 hits,7 runs, 1 double, 2 triples, 2 homers, 4 RBI, and 1 walk. 2B Yusheng Cai and CF Zuhairi Arif both won their 7^th Gold Gloves. 2B Kenny Sang won his 8^th Silver Slugger.