Keon-chang Seo

Keon-chang Seo (서건창)

• Bats Left, Throws Right
• Height 5' 10", Weight 171 lb.

• High School Gwangju Jeil High School

• Born August 22, 1989 in Hwasun County South Korea

BR register page

Biographical Information

Keon-chang Seo was the 2012 KBO Rookie of the Year and then won the MVP two years later.

Seo went 0 for 1 for the LG Twins in 2008 but was released by them the next year without batting again. He then served in the Korean military. In 2012, he returned to the KBO, now with the Nexen Heroes. His break came when Min-sung Kim was injured before the season, opening a job at 2B. He hit .266/.342/.367 with 10 triples and 39 steals in 51 tries. He led the KBO in triples, 3 ahead of Soo-bin Jung, and was second in swipes, 5 behind Yong-kyu Lee. He was named the KBO Rookie of the Year and also won the Gold Glove at 2B.

In 2013, Seo fell to .266/.352/.320 and stole 26 bases in 33 attempts. He did a lot of weight-lifting that off-season, switched to a heavier bat and adjusted his batting stance. The changes were dramatic - he batted .370/.438/.547. He led the 2014 KBO in average (5 points over Tae-kyun Kim), runs (9 more than teammate Byung-ho Park), hits (201, 26 more than Ah-seop Son, the first KBO player to top 200 in a year), doubles (41, 3 more than Tae-in Chae), triples (17, 8 ahead of runners-up Min-woo Park and Dae-hyung Lee) and caught stealing (17, 2 more than Dae-hyung Lee). He also was 4th in OBP (between Son and Byung-ho Park), 9th in OPS (between Son and Yamaico Navarro), 4th in total bases (297, between Eric Thames and Sung-bum Na) and third in steals (48, behind Sang-soo Kim and Min-woo Park). He scored the first run of the 2014 Korean Series, tripling off Rick van den Hurk and scoring on a double by Vinny Rottino, but Nexen wound up losing to the Samsung Lions as top power threats Byung-ho Park and Jung-ho Kang went cold. For his efforts, he was named KBO MVP, beating out the guy playing next to him on the infield, home run king Byung-ho Park, among others. Seo had 77 of 99 first-place votes to 13 for Park. He became only the second player to be named both KBO MVP and Rookie of the Year during their career, following Hyun-jin Ryu.

Sources

• Korean Wikipedia
• KBO player page
• Yonhap News