Kiwoom Kim Hye-seong's 'best friend' Lee Jeong-hoo, who dreams of becoming a major league player, declared his challenge for the big league and won gold at Hangzhou AG, saying, "The opportunity has come" Ha- Seong Kim's goal to play in MLB after the end of next season: “A junior I really want to see in MLB.”

On the 28th, second baseman Kim Hye-seong of Kiwoom, a professional baseball team, stood in front of the camera holding a bat at the Goyang National Baseball Stadium in Gyeonggi Province, the club's Futures League (second team) training ground. Kim Hye-seong, who has lived with the phrase 'cherish the moment' engraved in her heart, went to the baseball stadium in the morning and did personal training even on this day, which was her rest day. Hye-seong Kim set a goal of challenging the American professional baseball major league after the 2024 season.

“Kim Hye-seong (24, Kiwoom) will be a better player than me.”

Kim Ha-seong (28, San Diego), the first Korean player to win a Gold Glove in the Major League Baseball (MLB), said at a domestic press conference on the 20th, “We are paying attention to Kim Hye-sung as the next Korean player who can challenge MLB after Lee Jeong-hoo (25, Kiwoom). “There is,” he said.

Ha-seong Kim said, “I saw Hye-seong Kim play in the Asian Professional Baseball Championship (APBC), and I thought he was a bit different from players of his age. He added, “I understand that posting (private competitive bidding) will be possible after the season ends next year, and I really want to see it in MLB.” Before Ha-seong Kim entered the MLB, he had a meal with Jeong-hoo Lee and Hye-sung Kim at Kiwoom, a Korean professional baseball team.

Kim Hye-seong, who met at the Goyang National Baseball Stadium in Gyeonggi-do, the training ground for the Kiwoom Futures League (2nd team) on the 28th, also said, “Following my role model, Ha-seong Kim, my ‘best friend’ Jeong-hoo is also taking on the challenge, so my dream of improving my skills and entering the MLB has become even bigger.” He said. Kim Hye-seong is the same team that Lee Jung-hoo joined Kiwoom, but since he spent most of his professional debut year, 2017, in the second team, he must play one more season to advance to MLB.

Kim Hye-seong said, “I’m not the type of person who usually sets big goals. When I was young, I joined the pros, after my pro debut, I became a first-team fixture, and after that, I kept raising my goals to become a ‘good player.’” He said, “When I won the Golden Glove for the first time (in 2021), I thought, ‘I have become a good player now.’”

Kim Hye-seong, the 2021 Golden Glove winner in the shortstop category, received the Golden Glove as a second baseman last year. Kim Hye-seong was the first player in Korean professional baseball history to receive Golden Gloves in both positions. Kim Hye-seong said, “After receiving my second Golden Glove, I had a dream, ‘I want to go to the United States like senior Kim Ha-seong.’”

This season, Kim Hye-seong ranked second in most hits (186), second in runs scored (104 points), third in batting average (0.335), and fifth in on-base percentage (0.396), and is likely to win the Golden Glove Award in the second baseman category for the second consecutive year. It's a situation. In addition, he participated as a national team member in the World Baseball Classic (WBC) before the season opened, the Hangzhou Asian Games during the season, and the APBC after the season ended. Seven years after his professional debut, he became a leading infielder in Korean baseball.

Kim Hye-seong was a promising player who recorded a batting average of 0.489 during her third year at Dongsan High School in Incheon and received the 'Lee Young-min Batting Award' given to the best hitter in high school baseball. However, in the 2017 season, his first professional year, he appeared in 16 games and had a batting average of only 0.188 (3 hits in 16 at-bats). Kim Hye-seong thought to herself, “In order to succeed, I will give up things that have nothing to do with my goal,” and gave up her rest time to focus only on training. And he has continued to increase his batting average without skipping a year until this season.

Kim Hye-seong said, “When I was in high school, coach Han Yun-seop (38, KT) advised me, ‘You should cherish the moment and always do your best.’ “I have lived with those words engraved in my heart,” he said. “If I cherish the moment and work hard, I can achieve my goals one by one, and I feel great happiness every time.”

Kim Hye-seong's next goal is to form a keystone team again with senior Kim Ha-seong in MLB. Kim Hye-seong said, “It’s still in the distant future, but if I advance to MLB, I want to go to San Diego so I can play with Ha-seong. However, my personal favorite team is the LA Dodgers. “The best scenario is for Ha-seong to transfer to the Dodgers and me to join the Dodgers,” he said with a laugh.

If Kim Hye-seong had not won the gold medal at the Hangzhou Asian Games, she planned to enlist on the 18th of next month along with her teammate Ahn Woo-jin (24). Hye-seong Kim said, “If it weren’t for the gold medal, I wouldn’t have had next season, but this season came to me like luck. “I will work harder and become a better player,” he said. 슬롯