Latest in K-Sports

It's time for the latest in K-sports, we have everything covered from football to baseball to curling today. Our sportscaster Jason Lee is joining us in the studio for that. Hello Jason!

1. South Korea's men's national football team gets back into action at home next Thursday against Oman as well as the following week against Jordan as qualifying continues for next year's World Cup what can you tell us about the upcoming games?

Yes, Korea will host Oman Thursday night at Goyang Stadium, just north of Seoul.

It's been almost 4 months now since Korea last played that was a 1-1 draw against Palestine the only team Korea has not beaten in the 4th round so far.

Korea has a 3 point lead atop the Group B standings and more importantly they have a 5 point lead against 3rd place Jordan so IF Korea wins these next 2 games at home, they'll clinch a berth to next year's World Cup despite still having 2 more qualifying games to be played in June since the top 2 teams of their group earn automatic berths for next summer.

2. Jason, how about the roster that Hong Myung-bo has put together? I heard most of the players he selected for these games are those playing in Europe

Yes, that's correct. Obviously the usual Son Heung-Min, Lee Kang-In and Kim Min-Jae are included.

Additions to the line up of note include: Yang Hyun-Jun, who plays for Celtic in the Scottish Premier League and Yang Min-Hyuk, who's signed to Tottenham, but is currently on loan to QPR right now we've talked a lot about him already on this show.

There's no guarantee yet that either will get into either of the 2 games or even make the final roster for either game, but it does show that head coach Hong Myung-bo is acknowledging their play as of late in Europe.

3. Over to baseball You mentioned before that the worst case scenario for Kim Hye-Seong would be that he starts the year in the minors if his hitting didn't improve during Spring Training and that seems to be the case

Yes, Kim Hye-Seong will start his season in AAA after struggling out of the gun in Spring Training.

He was hitting just.207 when the decision was made, but I do want to point out that he has played much better over the past week compared to the week before and things might have been different if the Dodgers weren't starting the season Tuesday in Japan. That meant that the Dodgers and Cubs basically had to make roster decisions a week earlier than all the other teams and Kim Hye-Seong getting off to that slow start really hamstrung him. Considering that he's been hitting much better as of late including a home run and once the team returns from Japan they'll have some extra time before the rest of the League opens the season, I wouldn't be surprised to see Kim Hye-Seong join the team sometime in April.

4. What about Lee Jung-Hoo how has he been doing in the exhibition games? And are there any other Koreans to take note of in the Major League camps? (Bae Ji-Hwan)

Lee Jung-Hoo on the otherhand has been among the hotter hitters during Spring Training so far. He's hitting.333 with a pair of home runs already you can just tell that he's getting much more comfortable especially hitting out of the 3 hole, which is where he typically hit when he played in the KBO.

One other player I will quickly mention is Bae Ji-Hwan of the Pittsburgh Pirates.

He's been up and down the last 3 years between AAA and the majors and he didn't have a starting role going into Spring Training, but he might be able to force the issue. He's hitting.455 in 10 games with a home run and 3 doubles.

He can play both the outfield or 2nd base so he does have some positional versatility if there's a hole to fill and he's also quite fast with 33 steals in 150 Major League games so he might be another Korean to look for in the Majors this season

5. Among the medals Korea won at last month's Asian Winter Games in Harbin was a gold in women's curling and Korea will be hosting the Women's World Curling Championships starting this weekend in Uijeongbu how are Korea's chances of winning on home ice?

I remember 15 years ago saying that Korea should invest all their resources into Curling. It's a sport that requires accuracy, strategy and execution all things that Koreans excel in when it comes to other games and sports like: archery, Go, Esports, golf. And in large part because of the 2018 Olympics in Pyeongchang, Koreans have fallen in Love with Curling and for good reason in 2018 it was the Garlic Girls who captured the nation going onto a silver medal.

Right now, it's a new squad skipped by Kim Eun-ji that led her team to a gold medal at the Asian games and will look for Korea's first gold medal at a World Championships.

This team finished 3rd at last year's Championships and perhaps home ice advantage will be just what they need to get them over that hump against some of the world's top teams like Canada, Switzerland and Sweden.

Korea has been on the Podium in 3 of the last 5 World Championships so maybe some home cooking could help them to a gold.