SSG Landers Choo Shin-soo (41) is on the verge of reaching the 2,000-hit milestone in his Korean-American career. He will likely do so in his hometown of Busan, South Korea.
After graduating from Busan High School, Shin-soo Choo moved to the United States and has amassed 1,671 hits in the American big leagues. He made his big league debut with Seattle in 2005 and came up as a pinch-hitter in the ninth inning of a May 4 game against the Los Angeles Angels and hit a single to left field to bring home a runner from second base. It was his first big league hit and first RBI. He was traded to Cleveland in 2006, then to Cincinnati in 2013 before signing a free agent contract (seven years, $130 million) with Texas before the 2014 season.
He played 16 seasons in the big leagues through 2020, amassing 1,671 career hits. His 175 hits in 2009 with Cleveland were his most in a single season, and he had eight 140+ hit seasons. He also hit 20 home runs seven times and hit 218 home runs.
Shin-Soo Choo signed with SSG in 2021 and played in the KBO for the first time. He had 122 hits in 2021, 106 in 2022, and 97 in 2023. Until last year, he had totaled 96 hits in his Hanmi career.
This season, he got off to a slow start due to injuries. Shin-soo Choo was injured in spring training and sent home early, and in the opening game against Lotte, he was hit by a pitch and suffered an incontinence in the middle finger of his right hand.
He was out of the lineup for more than a month before returning to the first team on April 11. Since his return, 바카라사이트 he has added three hits. He had two hits against KT on the 13th and one against KT on the 14th, giving him 1999 hits in his Korean-American career.
Before the doubleheader against LG on the 21st, Lee said of Choo Shin-soo, "I wondered if I put him on the first team too soon. He was injured in camp and didn't get enough at-bats in the exhibition games. When I saw him bat today, I talked to the hitting coach and worked on some things that weren't good, and it wasn't bad. I'm going to start in Busan. I'm going to start the whole three-game series."
Choo came in as a pinch-hitter with runners on first and second in the bottom of the eighth inning of the first game of the doubleheader against LG, trailing 8-10, and drew a walk. In the second game of the doubleheader, he pinch-hit in the top of the ninth inning with the score tied 5-5 and hit a huge foul ball off LG closer Yoo Young-chan that cleared the left field foul pole before retiring on a grounder to third base.
Choo will be in the starting lineup against Lotte at Busan's Sajik Stadium on April 23, where he will attempt to reach the 2,000th hit in the Korean-American record books. He won't have a single hit in the three-game series.
