Yoo Hee-kwan ( Hangul: 유희관, Hanja: 柳熙寬) (born June 1, 1986 in Seoul) is a South Korean

starting pitcher In baseball (hardball or softball), a starting pitcher or starter is the first pitcher in the game for each team. A pitcher is credited with a game started if they throw the first pitch to the opponent's first batter of a game. Starting pit ...

for the Doosan Bears of the KBO League. He bats and throws left-handed.

Professional career

Yoo started his career with the Doosan Bears in 2009 and 2010, and played sporadically out of the bullpen. He then served in military duty for 2 years and played in the military's team, the

Sangmu Baseball Team Sangmu Phoenix ( ko, 상무 피닉스 야구단) is a South Korean professional baseball team founded in 2005. The team is part of the Korea Armed Forces Athletic Corps, and they play in the KBO Futures League. Their home stadium is Sangmu Base ...

. Upon returning to Doosan in 2013, he emerged has a surprisingly dominant starting pitcher, earning 10 wins and a 3.53 ERA. He consolidated his position in 2014 and 2015, winning 12 and 18 games respectively. In 2015, his 18 wins were good for second in the league, behind the NC Dinos' Eric Hacker. He was instrumental in Doosan's 2015 season Korean Series title, earning the win and game MVP honors in the decisive Game 5 against 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 ...

Pitching style

Yoo is known for his unconventional pitching style. Yoo has a fairly short stature for a pitcher, standing at 1.80 m, and is bulky, weighing 88 kg. Yoo is amongst the slowest hurlers in the league, as his fastball rarely tops 133 km/h (83 mph). Yoo, a left-handed pitcher, makes up for this slow delivery with excellent control, and a very efficient set of change-ups and breaking balls.

Personal life

Yoo graduated from Chung-Ang University, where he played college baseball. In college, he was an avid basketball player as well and became close friends with future KBL MVP Award winners Oh Se-keun and Kim Sun-hyung as members of the basketball and baseball teams shared the same dormitory.

Filmography

Television show

Web shows

References

External links

Yoo Hee-kwan
from the KBO League 1986 births Living people Baseball players from Seoul Doosan Bears players South Korean baseball players KBO League pitchers Chung-Ang University alumni {{SouthKorea-baseball-pitcher-stub