[K-Sports] 2025 KBO season kicks off Saturday

It's spring season weatherwise but also in the world of K-sports, as the baseball season throws its first pitch tomorrow, Saturday here in Korea.

In our sports segment today we will delve into the KBO and other latest sports issues with our sportscaster Jason Lee, who is joining us in the studio. Happy Friday Jason!

Q1-1. Let's start with the most recent sports event that we had our eyes on The first national team football match of the year.

Korea settled for a 1-1 draw against Oman in their World Cup qualifier soccer match last night please tell us more about the game.

Let's start with the good Lee Kang-in made an absolutely beautiful 20 yard pass right up the middle to Hwang Hee-Chan, who also made a beautiful take and finish for Korea's goal in the 40th minute.

It really was a beautiful goal and it came after what was a really boring first half with Oman essentially playing 11 men on defense making it really tough for Korea to get anything going offensively.

In the 2nd half with the 1-0 lead Korea got a little too cute in their defensive zone and turned it over rather than just clearing the ball and that led to Oman's goal in the 80th minute.

What's even more concerning is Lee Kang-In hurt himself on that play and had to exit the game.

So Korea didn't get the result they wanted and they also lost one of their top players to injury overall, not a good night for Korea in Goyang.

Q1-2) Now that's just the first of two games as Korea will host Jordan next Tuesday.

What will Korea have to do differently in that game for a win?

Well first off, I think it's safe to say that Jordan is a tougher opponent than Oman so Korea definitely needs to bring their A game.

I think they need to be patient and wait for Jordan to make a mistake.

Jordan is going to be playing for a 0-0 draw and hope that Korea gets over anxious in front of their home crowd and make a mistake so Korea needs to make sure they don't fall into that trap first and foremost.

Then it's a matter of keeping the pressure on Jordan without pushing for something that isn't there and wait for the opportunities to come. Korea's the more talented team so if they're just patient enough, I think the goals should come.

Q2. Jason, one of the reasons we brought you in again this week was to give a preview on the new KBO baseball season which begins tomorrow. What are the biggest stories we should be looking for in the 2025 season?

I think the biggest stories for this year will be whether or not we see a repeat of some of the stories from last year.

I think by far the biggest story last year was the emergence of Kia's Kim Do-Young, who hit 38 home runs while stealing 40 bases all while hitting.347 which was 3rd best in the league.

But the question this year becomes: "Was that all a fluke?"

If he only hits.280 with 25 home runs and 25 stolen bases that'll still be a good season and it would likely earn him MVP votes and likely a Gold Glove as the league's best 3rd baseman.

But those numbers would be a clear disappointment from what he achieved last year.

And I'm not saying he has to top those numbers or even match them but I would say if he were to bat just.300 while hitting say 30 home runs while stealing 30 bases would be enough for people to say ok he's the real deal and last year wasn't just a fluke.

Q3. How do YOU think he'll do this year?

I think he'll do something similar to last year he's clearly very talented and the fact he continued to produce in the post season as well as the Premiere 12 international tournament shows that he's not fazed by the bigger stage so I like his chances to definitely top 30 home runs and 30 stolen bases.

Q4. Other than Kim Do-Young, are there other verifications you'd like to see?

Yes, the other verification would be how the Kia Tigers respond as the defending champs.

They rode Kim Do-Young's season to the top of the standings last year, but what will their season look like if Kim Do-Young isn't able to repeat last year's breakout or misses time because of an injury or something else?

Guys like Choi Hyung-Woo and Yang Hyun-Jong are both aging veterans that don't have a lot of tread on the tires left.

How are they going to do this season and can Kia develop some of their younger players to step up if something goes wrong this season.

Lee Bum-ho led Kia to a championship in his first year as a manager and kudos to him for a job well done, but he really had a season where everything went right how can he do if everything goes wrong?

And the last validation I'll be curious to see is how the fans respond after record breaking attendance last season.

Fans attended games to the tune of 10.9 million tickets sold compared to the previous record of 8.4 million that's almost a 25% increase on their previous best. Will that be the new normal or a blip in the measurements?

What will the league do to ride that momentum?

Q5. How about your predictions as to who will most likely be in the Korean Series this year?

I think the Kia Tigers will have a good chance again this year, but they need to avoid injury.

One of the reasons they were so successful last year was they stayed healthy for the most part and they have some older players who can be injury prone so if they can stay healthy I like their chances.

Beyond them, I still like each of the teams that made it to the post season last year.

There's really no reason to dislike: Samsung, LG, Doosan and KT I could even see KT maybe climbing from their 5th place finish last season as they added Heo Kyung-Min from Doosan.

I know Kang Baek-Ho would like to go over to MLB and if he can produce a BIG season this year he might draw some attention so he'll be very motivated to produce.

Q6. And the World Women's Curling Championships are underway in Uijeongbu and wrap up on Sunday. How is Gim Eun-ji and the Korean women doing there so far?