Jong-wook Lee

Jong-wook Lee (이종욱)

• Bats Left, Throws Left
• Height 5' 9", Weight 170 lb.

• School Yeungnam University
• High School Sunrin Internet High School

• Born June 18, 1980 in Seoul South Korea

BR register page

Biographical Information

Jong-wook Lee is one of the top base-stealers in South Korea.

Lee entered the military after college despite a 90 million won bonus offer from the Hyundai Unicorns, who had drafted him. After his service time ended, he joined the Doosan Bears. As a rookie in 2006, he hit .284/~.361/.359 with 51 steals while only being caught 7 times. He scored 76 runs and led the Korea Baseball Organization in steals.

In 2007, Lee was even better, batting .316/~.371/.417 with 84 runs. He stole 47 bases, second in the KBO behind Dae-hyung Lee. He also finished 7th in the circuit in batting average. He won a Gold Glove as one of the top three overall outfielders in the KBO. In the 2007 Korean Series, Lee scored the winning run in Game One before Doosan lost 4 of the next 5 contests to the SK Wyverns.

Lee joined the South Korean national team for the 2007 Asian Championship. He was 2 for 8 with a home run, 3 walks, 5 RBI and one steal in two tries. Lee led the event in walks and tied Takahiro Arai and Young-min Ko for second in RBI, one behind Chin-Feng Chen.

In the 2008 Final Olympic Qualification Tournament, he hit .176/.391/.353 with 5 runs and 2 steals in 8 games. He tied for second in the event in steals, one behind Cristhian Presichi and Joo-chan Kim. He drove in two runs in their victory over Mexico and doubled in Yong-kyu Lee with a first-inning run against Team Canada in a 4-3 loss.

Lee was the center fielder and leadoff man for South Korea in the 2008 Olympics and hit .294/.342/.294 with 2 steals in 3 tries. He turned a double play to seal Korea's shutout win over host China and had a sacrifice fly to score the winner against Team USA. In the preliminary phase, he was 9th in average (.370) and tied Masahiro Araki, Giorvis Duvergel, Hyun-soo Kim, Tsuyoshi Nishioka, Eduardo Paret and Lingfeng Sun for the most steals (2).

During the 2008 KBO campaign, Lee hit .301/.376/.354 with 47 steals in 55 tries. He was second in swipes behind Dae-hyung Lee. He joined Hyun-soo Kim and Karim Garcia in being honored as the top outfielders in the KBO with a Gold Glove.

Lee was Korea's main center fielder and leadoff man in the 2009 World Baseball Classic, hitting .158/.320/.158 for the second-place team. He did score 6 runs in 9 games and was 2-for-2 in steal attempts.

Lee hit for the cycle on April 11 against the LG Twins, the 14th KBO player to perform the feat and only the second to do it for Doosan. He was hitting .268/.311/.350 after 34 games in 2009, with 12 steals in 15 tries. On June 2, though, he broke his chin and cut his neck in a collision with teammate Jae-ho Kim.

Sources

• IBAF site
• KBO player page
• Korean wikipedia entry
• 2008 Olympics
• World Baseball Classic
• The Korea Times