Following the first championship ring in his life, even an annual salary of 100 million won. For Yoon-seok Oh (31) and Joon-tae Kim (29), the trade transfer was a godsend.
On the 29th, KT Wiz concluded an annual salary contract for the 2023 season with 61 candidates for renewal. KT players headed to Tucson, Arizona, USA, where the spring camp was held through Incheon International Airport this afternoon.
According to KT’s announcement, out of 61 players, a total of 14 players receive annual salaries worth billions this year, excluding free agents and military veterans. Among them, there are four new billionaires, including infielder Oh Yoon-seok and catcher Kim Jun-tae, who moved their nests side by side from Lotte to KT through a trade. Oh Yoon-seok received 120 million won, a 33.3% increase from 90 million won last year, and Kim Jun-tae received 100 million won, a 53.8% increase from 65 million won last year.
On the last day of July 2021, Oh Yoon-seok and Kim Jun-tae transferred from Lotte to KT through a trade with right-handed sidearm pitcher Lee Kang-jun. Desperately in need of depth reinforcement to win the championship, KT recruited two players while giving away a promising submarine throwing a 150km fastball, and they were reborn as members of KT’s first integrated championship that year.
Unfortunately, both players did not see much light during their Lotte days. After graduating from Gyeonggi High School and Yonsei University, Oh Yoon-seok entered the professional league as a training player for Lotte in 2014. After that, he worked as a managing director and hit his potential with a batting average of 2998 in 2020, and on October 4 of that year, he became the protagonist of the 27th cycling hit in KBO history at the Sajik Hanwha game. However, despite the great record, his position in the Lotte infield gradually narrowed and was used as a trade card.
Oh Yoon-seok was named to the starting list for the opening game in KT’s first full-time season last year. He played 115 games in the season, breaking his personal record for most appearances in a season since his first team debut in 2015. However, he had to rehabilitate for a long time due to a back injury during the season, and finished the year with a batting average of 2.34, 6 homers and 37 RBIs.
Kim Jun-tae, like Oh Yoon-seok, joined Lotte as a training player in 2012 and failed to stand out, then left Lotte and moved to KT. His performance in his first year was mediocre. In the aftermath of knee surgery during Lotte, he belatedly made his KT debut on October 6, and promised the next season with a batting average of 10.18 in 11 games due to the system of Jang Seong-woo and Heo Do-hwan.
Kim Jun-tae took on the important role of supporting Jang Seong-woo, the starting player, as Heo Do-hwan transferred to LG as a free agent the following year. It was true that a question mark was attached to his homeroom plan during his spring camp, but he confidently turned that question mark into an exclamation mark through his skills. Last year, with a stable pitching lead, he played an active role in 98 games with a batting average of 27%, 4 home runs and 27 RBIs, and was reborn as the clear second-in-command of KT’s catchers.
The two players, who received annual salaries of billions of won, are expected to be given an important mission this year. Oh Yoon-seok has to erase KT’s second base worries this year to match his reputation as ‘Post Park Kyung-soo’, and Kim Jun-tae also has to complete the task of arranging the physical strength of 33-year-old catcher Jang Seong-woo. It doesn’t shine much, but only if they play their role in their respective positions increases the likelihood that KT will reproduce the glory of 2021. 안전놀이터
With the transfer in July 2021, he won the championship ring that he had only dreamed of in his Lotte days, and in two years he received a billion won salary. Both Oh Yoon-seok and Kim Jun-tae opened the flower path of baseball life through trade.