Jong-wook Lee
From BR Bullpen
Jong-wook Lee
- Bats Left, Throws Left
- Height 5' 9", Weight 170 lb.
- School Yeungnam University
- High School Sunrin Internet High School
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).
