I suppose this will be the last Cubs signing from Korea that I haven’t seen play much first-hand. I don’t even have a lot to report, but I at least wanted to acknowledge his signing and pass along some of what I’ve heard since it’s clearly been big news in my part of the world. I’ll start doing normal updates from now.
In fact I was going to wait until a press conference had been held, but the Korean media started reporting the signing a couple weeks ago. As far as I know, the first and only English outlet to pick up on it was Taiwan Baseball, which has a summary of an article published in the Dong-a newspaper.
Lee is a shortstop from Chungam High School. The paper lists him as being 6′0, 170 lbs., but he’s closer to 6′2 and probably heavier. I saw him practice last week and it’s the only time I’ve seen him play. But as someone still new to the scout game it was a great experience just to watch him. To use the familiar adage, he was a man amongst boys. It was as if an MLB player had stumbled onto a field in rural South Korea and started taking ground balls. The balls just ambled into his glove and his catch and release was so quick — it was a textbook example.
But that glossy description shouldn’t overshadow his arm, which is also clearly big league. I saw him field a ball across his body, and moving toward third. He didn’t stop, he just pulled up a little and threw it on a line to first.
Again, I feel kind of silly raving about this guy I haven’t even seen in a game, and I’m also not used to writing in this first-person/scout style, but I can say the Cubs are really excited about him. They believe he’d be a first round pick in the states, and one of the people who scouted him also scouted Derek Jeter in high school and says Lee has better tools at his age than Jeter did back in the early 90s.
He hits from the left side and is blazing fast. His time down the line is right around four seconds. I saw one video of him in a scrimmage, filmed through a steel cage behind the catcher. He hits what looks like a line drive (keep in mind this is amateur video) and disappears from the frame for a few seconds. Then, what would appear to be a blur goes across the screen — it’s Hakju running from first to third. Sure, a lot of it had to do with the angle and the quality of the video, but it was still amazing.
It’s going to be fun to track him from this vantage point, but I’m also a little bummed out because I get the impression that the likelihood of me scouting someone with this kind of talent is not likely. Too bad for me. Possibly great news for the Cubs.
Incidentally, the Korean article quotes my boss, Steve Wilson, as comparing Lee to Ichiro. I’ve always read things about the Korean media being a little footloose with facts, and then experienced that first hand when I found and reported a Hankook Ilbo story that Jose Lima had been released by the Kia Tigers, only to find out it was completely untrue. Well, here is a quote used in a story that would appear to be completely invented. Steve has never compared Lee to Ichiro or even spoken to a Korean reporter about Lee.
The financial figures reported in the story would also seem to be from somewhere in the ether.
Lee is going to start off in an Australian camp once school wraps up in June, and by next spring he’ll be assigned to either a rookie team or Peoria.
11 responses so far ↓
1 Brian // Apr 30, 2008 at 8:56 pm
So does he play for the high school team? Always curious how that worked. Back in the States every high school fielded teams, but here only certain “sports schools” have teams, right?
Do you know what how to say that—sports school—in Korean? There’s one or two down here and I’m curious to find out more about them.
2 Shinsano // Apr 30, 2008 at 10:06 pm
As far as I know there’s no special word for sports schools like these. All the schools seem to just use 고교.
He does play for the high school team. I asked one of the kids if they study or if they just play baseball all day and he said they study in the morning.
It must be hard for the guys who don’t make it to get into good universities or get good jobs. I suppose that’s not totally different from the states, but I always feel that dynamic is more pronounced (severe) over here.
3 baekgom84 // May 1, 2008 at 1:38 am
I don’t think there’s any specific way of knowing which schools focus heavily on sports and which don’t - you just have to know. Nearby my house is Bupyeong High School which is one of the most famous high schools in Incheon for soccer players - apparently Lee Chun-soo and Kim Nam-il graduated from here - but there’s nothing in the name which denotes it as being dedicated to soccer or to sports in general.
I find it amazing that kids here make it as far as they do, given the enormous pressure to study hard and get ‘real’ jobs. What did Park Ji-sung’s or Lee Seung-yeop’s parents say to them when they told them that they wanted to pursue a career in sports? In all the time I’ve taught here, I’ve not once come across a kid who’s said, ‘I want to play soccer (or baseball) when I grow up,’ even if that’s really what they want to do. They all want to be doctors or lawyers or architects or diplomats.
4 Luke // May 1, 2008 at 2:11 am
Fantastic news as a Cubs fan. Exciting to see Steve Wilson sign quite a few guys on the Pac Rim (Chen, Rhee and Searle last year; Hams, Spencer and now Lee this year). Also exciting since the Cubs farm system is currently and historically devoid of talent at shortstop. Is he really just 18?
By the way, GREAT blog.
5 Brian // May 1, 2008 at 7:00 pm
“In all the time I’ve taught here, I’ve not once come across a kid who’s said, ‘I want to play soccer (or baseball) when I grow up,’ even if that’s really what they want to do. They all want to be doctors or lawyers or architects or diplomats.”
Yeah, but that’s kind of nice. Far too many kids back home delude themselves into thinking they’re the next big thing. Football, even high school football, is a really big deal in Pittsburgh, and every year you read about kids getting free rides to the top universities in the country, but who four years down the line don’t amount to anything professionally and can’t do much with a “Communications” or “Liberal Arts” degree.
That said, I wouldn’t mind catching a HS or college baseball game. Shinsano, is there a Korean college league? Do you have a link to it?
6 Shinsano // May 1, 2008 at 10:10 pm
Isn’t Hyocheon HS in your neck of the woods? You might go see them. They’re probably playing qualifying games for the Blue Dragon Tourney, which is next month.
Actually, if you have a chance to see Gwangju Ju Il (광주일고) it might be worth the trip. That team is like a machine. Legendary HS baseball program. School of Kim BH, Choi HS and Seo JW.
I actually don’t know a lot about college teams other than there’s one in Ulsan.
7 baekgom84 // May 2, 2008 at 8:46 am
I know what you mean Brian, and for all the talk about ‘you can do anything you put your mind to’ and all that motivational jargon, the odds are that kids will fail more often than not, and the question is always how much damage will the failure do to them when they realise they have no crutch to fall back on?
But I guess what I meant is that I felt it was a bit of a shame to see kids in the third grade of elementary school making practical career choices. I guess in a country with a job market as competitive as this one, it makes sense.
I’d also love to go see College or HS baseball here, but I found it tricky to find information on it. I’ve seen scores of college games posted on the Koreabaseball website, and I’ve seen the occasional HS game on TV but that’s about it. Is there a Korean website that covers this sort of thing?
8 Shinsano // May 2, 2008 at 9:21 am
Unfortunately, there’s really not a good web site for this stuff. This is a high school baseball forum (only in Korean) where they occasionally post info on games. But you need a login for a good part of the site.
Baekgom, you could go check out Inchon HS, which has a good HS program. Not sure what to tell you about getting a schedule though.
I too have always been struck by kids not wanting to professional athletes. And I’ve met just a couple who have professed a desire to be an entertainer or artist. My wife goes as far to label those kids “not smart,” and unable to do anything else…just to throw in a harsh Korean perspective here.
I find it refreshing as well…although, there are obviously plenty of problems in Korea due to their desire for more “practical” kinds of success.
9 Gary Garland // May 5, 2008 at 1:55 pm
Here’s to hoping the new Cubs signing works out well. A real Korean MLB superstar would be great for the game in that country.
But it is just so hard to project. I really thought, for example, that Masahiro Nagata was going to be the next Kazuo Matsui (even with a lot of moving parts to his swing) and a Mets scout later called him the best high school infield prospect in the world at the time, but he didn’t develop for Yomiuri and is now in the Orix system.
On the other hand, I also said that Hanshin getting Tomoyuki Kubota as a fourth rounder was a joke, that they had pulled a bank heist on all the other NPB clubs. That was accurate, even with his occasional inconsistency, and I was on the Darvish bandwagon before anyone. So you win some and you lose some.
10 simon // May 5, 2008 at 2:41 pm
When did you hop on the Darvish bandwagon? I was probably middle of the pack, latching on near the beginning of his high school career
11 Hire Jim Essian! » Blog Archive » Sweet Uncle Lou’s Friday Roundup: The “Whatever Jim Says” Edition // May 16, 2008 at 11:01 pm
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