SUWON -- The KT Wiz, after years as the bottom feeder of South Korean baseball, finally earned their inaugural Korean Series title in 2021. And the goal for their manager, Lee Kang-chul, in 2022 is simple: defend that championship. "I feel like defending the turf is a lot more difficult than going after the trophy the first time," Lee said in an interview at KT Wiz Park in Suwon, about 45 kilom...

Nearly a decade into his club football career, South Korean defender Kwon Kyung-won recently joined his sixth club in the fourth different country. There is more to this than wanderlust for the 29-year-old, who signed with Gamba Osaka of Japan on New Year's Day after stints in South Korea, Saudi Arabia and China. Kwon wants to challenge himself in different circumstances in his never-ending sear...

The South Korean four-man bobsleigh team led by an Olympic medal-winning pilot had its best performance of the season in the final race before the Beijing Winter Games. Won Yun-jong led his quartet to a 10th place finish at the season-ending International Bobsleigh & Skeleton Federation (IBSF) World Cup in St. Moritz, Switzerland, on Sunday (local time), with a combined time of 2:10.28 after two...

Of the seven medals that South Korea won in speed skating at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics, none was more surprising than the out-of-the-blue silver by Cha Min-kyu in the men's 500m. Sure, he had won an odd medal here and there at other international races, but an Olympic podium finish was completely unexpected. But lost in the hoopla over that silver was just how close Cha came to winni...

South Korean high school baseball prospect Cho Won-bin has inked a deal with the St. Louis Cardinals, months after pulling out of the domestic league draft in pursuit of an American dream. Cho was one of 12 international free agent signings announced by the Cardinals on Saturday (US local time). He is the first Asian amateur to sign with the Cardinals. Cho, set to graduate from Seoul Convention...

Former manager Youm Kyoung-youb was named the new technical director for South Korean baseball Friday, with his main task being assembling the national team for this year's Asian Games. The Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) said Youm will soon fill out the rest of the technical committee and take scouting trips through KBO clubs' spring training starting next month. Youm, 53, previously managed...

After an ultimately unsuccessful stint in Europe, former FC Barcelona youth player Paik Seung-ho has been penning a much better chapter of his career at home. His success with the K League 1 champions Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors has also led to multiple callups to the senior men's national team. And Paik says there is no secret to his midcareer turnaround. "I have gotten better because I have been p...

With South Korea's World Cup qualifying campaign scheduled to resume later this month, the team's head coach Paulo Bento hasn't abandoned hope of having two of his most important players back from injuries. South Korea's only two active Premier League players, Son Heung-min of Tottenham Hotspur and Hwang Hee-chan of Wolverhampton Wanderers, have both been sidelined. Son, who picked up a leg musc...

With South Korea on the verge of reaching the 2022 FIFA World Cup, players from the domestic league will have a couple of cracks this month at stating their case for inclusion on the national team for upcoming qualifying matches. The first will come in the form of a friendly match against Iceland in Antalya, Turkey, on Saturday. The kickoff at Mardan Sports Complex is 2 p.m. local time, or 8 p.m...

Kim Sei-young had collected at least one LPGA victory in every season since bursting on to the scene in 2015, but that streak came to an end in 2021. Looking back on last season, Kim said Thursday she might have overexerted herself in the early months, and she had hit a wall before she could get anything going. Still hoping to reach the top of the rankings, the world No. 5 said she will try to ...

The South Korean professional football will have its earliest start to a season in 2022 to accommodate participation in the FIFA World Cup in November, the league office announced Thursday. The 2022 K League 1 season will kick off Feb. 19, the fastest opening to a season by eight days. The 2010 and 2021 campaigns both began Feb. 27. The dozen teams in the top flight will play 38 matches. They w...

Doosan Bears' sidearm pitcher Choi Won-joon likes to live high in the strike zone. He threw his fastball about 58 percent of the time last year, and about 40 percent of those pitches sat in the top of the zone. Until last year, Choi wasn't always getting strike calls on those pitches. But things are expected to change this upcoming season, with the Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) set out to ex...

With FC Seoul having gone through a topsy-turvy 2021 season that included a coaching change, new bench boss An Ik-soo decided to give some of his veterans extra rest before the starting of offseason training camp. Conspicuous by their absences at FC Seoul's camp in Namhae, some 500 kilometers south of the capital city, are some of the club's most recognizable names: midfielders Ki Sung-yueng and...

Two-time Olympic short track speed skating champion Shim Suk-hee launched her last-minute legal battle against a recent two-month ban on Wednesday, trying to salvage a chance to compete at next month's Beijing Winter Games. It was last Thursday that Shim filed for a court injunction against the penalty handed down by the Korea Skating Union (KSU) in December, ruling her out of the Feb. 4-20 Wint...

SEOGWIPO -- One of the great mysteries in South Korean football in recent months has been the continued absence of Jeju United striker Joo Min-kyu on the senior men's national team. Though he won the scoring title in the top-flight K League 1 last year with 22 goals in 34 matches, Joo has been consistently overlooked by national team head coach Paulo Bento. The Portuguese boss has sidestepped qu...