Kang Bong-Kyu (

Hangul The Korean alphabet, known as Hangul, . Hangul may also be written as following South Korea's standard Romanization. ( ) in South Korea and Chosŏn'gŭl in North Korea, is the modern official writing system for the Korean language. The let ...

: 강봉규,

Hanja Hanja (Hangul: ; Hanja: , ), alternatively known as Hancha, are Chinese characters () used in the writing of Korean. Hanja was used as early as the Gojoseon period, the first ever Korean kingdom. (, ) refers to Sino-Korean vocabulary, wh ...

: 康奉珪) (born January 12, 1978, in

Busan Busan (), officially known as is South Korea's most populous city after Seoul, with a population of over 3.4 million inhabitants. Formerly romanized as Pusan, it is the economic, cultural and educational center of southeastern South Korea, w ...

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

) is an

outfielder An outfielder is a person playing in one of the three defensive positions in baseball or softball, farthest from the batter. These defenders are the left fielder, the center fielder, and the right fielder. As an outfielder, their duty is to cat ...

who played for the

Samsung Lions The Samsung Lions () are a South Korean professional baseball team founded in 1982. They are based in the southeastern city of Daegu and are members of the KBO League. Their home stadium is Daegu Samsung Lions Park. They have won the Korean Champ ...

in the

Korea Baseball Organization The Korea Baseball Organization (KBO; ko, 한국야구위원회) is the governing body for the professional leagues of baseball in South Korea. The KBO was founded in 1981 and has governed two leagues: the KBO League ( ko, KBO 리그) and KBO ...

. He bats and throws right-handed. From 2017, he is the batting coach for the

Amateur career

While attending Kyungnam High School, Kang was considered one of the best hitting pitchers in the Korean high school baseball league. As an ace pitcher and

cleanup hitter In baseball, a cleanup hitter is the fourth hitter in the batting order. The cleanup hitter is traditionally the team's most powerful hitter. His job is to "clean up the bases", i.e., drive in base runners. Theory The thinking behind the us ...

in Kyungnam High School, he led his team to runners-up at the Golden Lion Flag national championship in and the Hwarang Flag national championship in . In September , Kang was selected for the South Korea national junior baseball team to compete at the 3-Nation Junior Baseball Championship in

Seoul Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 ...

, along with Kim Sun-Woo,

Seo Jae-Weong Jae Weong Seo (; Hanja: 徐在應; ; born May 24, 1977), usually referred to as simply Jae Seo and pronounced "Jay So", is a retired South Korean professional baseball pitcher. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the New York Mets, Lo ...

and

Park Jin-Man Park Jin-man (born November 30, 1976) is a retired South Korean baseball shortstop. He batted and threw right-handed. He won the KBO League Golden Glove Award five times, and was also the 2006 Korean Series MVP. He competed for the South Korea ...

. Upon graduation from high school in , Kang chose to play college baseball at

Korea University Korea University (KU, ) is a private research university in Seoul, South Korea, established in 1905. The university is included as one of the SKY universities, a popular acronym referring to Korea's three most prestigious universities. The ...

instead of turning pro directly and completely quit pitching to focus on hitting. However, in August he was called up to the South Korea national junior baseball team again as a pitcher for the

World Junior Baseball Championship The U-18 Baseball World Cup is the 18-and-under baseball world championship sanctioned by the International Baseball Federation (IBAF) and its successor, the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC), and was first held in 1981 in the United ...

held in Sancti Spiritus,

Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...

. In July 1997, as a sophomore at Korea University, Kang got his first call-up to the South Korea national baseball team for the team's five annual friendly matches against the

USA national baseball team The United States national baseball team represents the United States in international-level baseball competitions. The team is currently ranked 5th in the world by the World Baseball Softball Confederation. Team USA won the Olympic baseball to ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, United States. In July 1998, as a junior, Kang was selected as a member of the South Korea national baseball team and led his team to runner-up at the 1998 Baseball World Cup as a starting

third baseman A third baseman, abbreviated 3B, is the player in baseball or softball whose responsibility is to defend the area nearest to third base — the third of four bases a baserunner must touch in succession to score a run. In the scoring system us ...

. In December 1998, as an amateur player, Kang was selected for the South Korea national team that won the gold medal in the baseball tournament of the 1998 Asian Games in

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estima ...

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

. In the tourney, he served as a backup to KBO star

Kim Dong-Joo Kim Dong-Joo (Hangul: 김동주, Hanja: 金東柱) (born February 3, 1976 in Seoul, South Korea) is a retired South Korean third baseman, who played his entire career for the Doosan Bears in the KBO League. He batted and threw right-handed. Am ...

third base A third baseman, abbreviated 3B, is the player in baseball or softball whose responsibility is to defend the area nearest to third base — the third of four bases a baserunner must touch in succession to score a run. In the scoring system us ...

Notable international careers

Professional career

Kang was signed by the

Doosan Bears The Doosan Bears ( ko, 두산 베어스) are a South Korean professional baseball team based in Seoul. Founded in 1982, they are a member of the KBO League. The Bears have won six Korean Series titles (1982, 1995, 2001, 2015, 2016, and 2019) and ...

in , playing mostly as a backup

against left-handed

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw ...

s. He was traded to the

in with Kim Chang-Hee in exchange for Kang Dong-Woo. Over his career in the Bears Kang compiled a .240 batting average and 10 home runs.

2009

2009 File:2009 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The vertical stabilizer of Air France Flight 447 is pulled out from the Atlantic Ocean; Barack Obama becomes the first African American to become President of the United States; 2009 Iran ...

, Kang had the most brilliant season in his pro career. He played in 126 games, batted .310 with 20 home runs, 139 hits and 78 RBI, and posted career-highs in all the offensive categories, finishing in the top 10 of the league in 4 different offensive categories (sixth in runs and tenth in

batting Batting may refer to: * Batting (baseball), the act of attempting to hit a ball thrown by the pitcher with a baseball bat, in order to score runs * Batting (cricket), the act of defending one's wicket with the cricket bat while attempting to score ...

on-base percentage In baseball statistics, on-base percentage (OBP) measures how frequently a batter reaches base. An official Major League Baseball (MLB) statistic since 1984, it is sometimes referred to as on-base average (OBA), as it is rarely presented as a ...

and

slugging percentage In baseball statistics, slugging percentage (SLG) is a measure of the batting productivity of a hitter. It is calculated as total bases divided by at bats, through the following formula, where ''AB'' is the number of at bats for a given player, ...

). On September 25, Kang stole his 20th bases of the season in the first inning of Lions' final game of the 2009 season against Hanhwa Eagles to become a member of the 20-20 club. Kang was selected as

' MVP of the year. On December 11, 2009, at the 2009 Golden Gloves Award Ceremony, Kang was awarded "The Fair Play Trophy" and "Most Improved Player" by the KBO.

2010

Kang was selected as captain of

2011

On Oct. 31, 2011 in 5th game of 2011 Korean Series against SK Wyverns, Kang hit a solo home run to lead

to Korean Series Championship and was awarded the MVP of Game 5.

External links

Profile and stats on the KBO official site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kang, Bong-Gyu 1978 births Asian Games gold medalists for South Korea Asian Games medalists in baseball Baseball players at the 1998 Asian Games Doosan Bears players KBO League outfielders Korea University alumni Kyungnam High School alumni Living people Medalists at the 1998 Asian Games Samsung Lions players South Korean baseball players Baseball players from Busan Bong-kyu