The Most Famous
BASEBALL PLAYERS from South Korea
This page contains a list of the greatest South Korean Baseball Players. The pantheon dataset contains 91 Baseball Players, 2 of which were born in South Korea. This makes South Korea the birth place of the 6th most number of Baseball Players behind Puerto Rico, and Venezuela.
Top 2
The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary South Korean Baseball Players of all time. This list of famous South Korean Baseball Players is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography's online popularity.
1. Hyun-jin Ryu (b. 1987)
With an HPI of 44.93, Hyun-jin Ryu is the most famous South Korean Baseball Player. His biography has been translated into 19 different languages on wikipedia.
Hyun-jin Ryu (Korean: 류현진; Hanja: 柳賢振; Korean pronunciation: [ɾju.çʌndʑin]; born March 25, 1987) is a South Korean professional baseball pitcher for the Hanwha Eagles of the KBO League. He has previously played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Los Angeles Dodgers and Toronto Blue Jays. In 2013, after spending seven seasons with the Eagles, he became the first player from the KBO to join an MLB team via the posting system. During the 2018 World Series, Ryu became the first Korean pitcher to start in a World Series game. In 2019, Ryu earned a selection to his first career Major League Baseball All-Star Game. During that season, he led the Majors in earned run average (ERA) and achieved an ERA of 1.26 through his first 14 starts, the lowest by a Dodgers pitcher since the statistic became official in 1912.
2. Park Kun-woo (b. 1990)
With an HPI of 32.54, Park Kun-woo is the 2nd most famous South Korean Baseball Player. His biography has been translated into 6 different languages.
Park Kun-woo (Korean: 박건우; born September 8, 1990) is a South Korean professional baseball outfielder for the NC Dinos of the KBO League. He joined the Doosan Bears through the second draft in 2009 after graduating from Seoul High School. On September 2, 2009, he made his first hit and scored his first run in his debut game. After the 2010 season, he temporarily left the Doosan Bears to serve a two-year mandatory military commitment. He played for the Korean Police Baseball Team during the military duty in 2011 and 2012. He played for the South Korea national baseball team at the 2017 World Baseball Classic. In 2017, he joined the 20–20 club as the first player in the Bears history.
People
Pantheon has 2 people classified as South Korean baseball players born between 1987 and 1990. Of these 2, 2 (100.00%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living South Korean baseball players include Hyun-jin Ryu, and Park Kun-woo.
