유지호
| 2023-03-03 15:33:28
baseball-teammates
Padres infielder Kim Ha-seong trying to be good teammate at WBC
By Yoo Jee-ho
SEOUL, March 3 (Yonhap) -- Whether it's encouraging his pitchers or trying to help a fellow big leaguer navigate his way around Seoul for the first time, South Korean infielder Kim Ha-seong is trying to be a good teammate for the upcoming World Baseball Classic (WBC).
Kim, entering his third season for the San Diego Padres, is one of South Korea's two major leaguers at the tournament, along with St. Louis Cardinals infielder Tommy Edman.
Edman, an American born to a Korean mother, is the first foreign national to represent South Korea at an international baseball tournament. The WBC has a loose set of eligibility rules, under which players are allowed to represent the country of at least one parent's birth even if they themselves aren't from that country.
Edman is also in South Korea for the first time and speaks only a few Korean words. That Kim is the only other major leaguer and will be Edman's double play partner makes Kim the perfect guide for the U.S.-born veteran.
"I've talked to him about our cultural differences, and I also told him baseball is essentially the same in both countries," Kim said Friday after live batting practice at Gocheok Sky Dome in Seoul. "When I first went to the U.S., I realized they were doing the same things I did back home. And I told Edman we basically do all the plays that they do in the U.S. too. I just try to spend as much time by his side as I can to keep him company."
The two players took part in their first live batting practice Friday. They both missed the national team's training camp in Arizona, owing to their club commitments, and haven't played in a game since spring training action over the weekend.
They arrived in South Korea on Wednesday and had their first workout with the rest of the national team Thursday. South Korea was to play a scrimmage later Friday against a local minor league team, but Kim and Edman aren't eligible because it's not an official exhibition sanctioned by the tournament.
They instead faced two pitchers, left-hander Koo Chang-mo and right-hander Won Tae-in, for eight plate appearances apiece.
Kim yelled some words of encouragement to the two hurlers and said afterward it was by design.
"This is still just practice, and I wanted to let the pitchers know they had great stuff whenever I saw good pitches," Kim said. "Tae-in threw some really good changeups, and Chang-mo's fastballs had some good life to them. I thought it was important to pump their tires."
South Korea's first WBC game is Thursday against Australia at Tokyo Dome.
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