Kim, 29, was signed Feb. 24 to a one-year, non-guaranteed contract with an $850,000 salary and as much as $1.15 million available in performance bonuses. But he has been a major disappointment from the outset, taking five days to sign that contract after the agreement had been reached, then needing two weeks to get his arm into shape to pitch.
Once Kim finally pitched, it got worse: He had a 14.40 ERA and five home runs in as many innings.
As one senior team official put it, "He hasn't exactly made much of an impression."
That continued yesterday, when Kim missed what likely was his last chance to impress. He had been scheduled to pitch the seventh inning of the Pirates' game against the Minnesota Twins -- a 7-3 victory -- but he told the coaching staff he was ill and was given permission to leave McKechnie Field shortly after noon.
Kim was the first Korean in Pirates history. Not sure if he'll actually count, though, since he never pitched a regular season game for them. I wonder if he'll end up signing with the team in Gwangju? Former Major Leaguers Hee-seop Choi and Jaewong Seo are there, as is Jose Lima. As the East Windup Chronicle points out, if Kim doesn't stick around, and if Park Chan-ho gets cut, there won't be any Koreans in the Major Leagues.
And, according to today's Post-Gazette, Masumi Kuwata will retire. He was signed last year and was the first-ever Japanese player on the Pirates. The Post-Gazette tells us that he was a superstar in Japan, but in true Pirates fashion, they signed him as a 39-year-old, thirteen years after his MVP season. Thinking being that any Japanese player is better than your run-of-the-mill Pirate. The chronological sequence on his Baseball Reference wiki page is funny: "2003-2006: Further decline," "To the USA." From the Post-Gazette:
The Pirates offered him a chance to pitch today against the Detroit Tigers, one final time, but respectfully declined and said he preferred to simply watch the game from the bullpen.
General manager Neal Huntington also offered him a coaching job, and he turned that down, too.
Kuwata, a 20-year veteran in the Japanese Central League and 1994 most valuable player, fulfilled his dream of pitching in Major League Baseball last year when the Pirates promoted him June 9 for a game at Yankee Stadium. He would make 19 appearances and have a 9.43 ERA.
Pitch 19 games for Pittsburgh, get cut, be a coach. I guess the job market back home isn't as tough as I thought. Anyway, I felt really bad when Kuwata got cut last year. His family flew in from Japan to see him pitch in the Majors for the first time, and he got released the next day.
Interesting to note that the only two Koreans to ever play in the NHL got their start in Pittsburgh. Jim Paek spent parts of four seasons with the Penguins and earned two Stanley Cup rings. And Richard Park was drafted by the Penguins in 1994 and played 58 lackluster games with them before finding more success elsewhere. And an interesting bit of trivia is that the Pirates were reportedly trying to sign Lee Seung-yeop a couple of years ago. If I remember correctly, he was looking for big money, though, and when the Pirates and a half-dozen other teams wouldn't pay $25 million for an unproven, smallish slugger, he went back to Japan.
No comments:
Post a Comment