9 hours Ago By Korea Bizwire
Jake Cave of the Doosan Bears takes a swing during a Korea Baseball Organization preseason game against the Kia Tigers at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in Seoul on March 13, 2025, in this photo provided by the Bears. (Image courtesy of Yonhap) SEOUL, March 14 (Korea Bizwire) — Throughout his professional career that has spanned over a decade, Jake Cave has played for coaches who had once been great players. Now in his first season with the Doosan Bears in the Korea Baseball Organization (KBO), the American outfielder will be playing for a manager who still owns the Korean league’s single-season home run record and sits No.
2 on the all-time home run rankings: Lee Seung-yuop. As he tries to settle into the new league, Cave said he will try to learn from Lee as much as he can. “Managers are kind of more stoic, and they’re more to themselves.
But he’s been very easy to talk to whenever I’ve needed to talk to him,” Cave told Yonhap News Agency before a preseason game against the Kia Tigers at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in Seoul on Thursday. “It’s pretty cool to be like, ‘Hey, that’s my manager, and I’m talking to the Babe Ruth of the KBO.’” Lee, now in his third season as manager, retired in 2017 with 467 home runs in 15 seasons in the KBO, including a record 56 home runs in 2003.
He played in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball from 2004 to 2011 and launched 159 homers there, making him the only South Korean player with over 600 professional home runs. If not for those eight years overseas, Lee would have had over 600 home runs in the KBO alone. Though Lee was replaced by Choi Jeong of the SSG Landers as the career home run leader last year, many — even Choi himself — consider Lee to be the greatest home run hitter in KBO history.
“It doesn’t matter where you play. That’s a lot of homers, man,” Cave said, when told of Lee’s career total. For Cave, brought in to hit dingers in the heart of the Bears’ lineup, there is perhaps no better person to talk to than the skipper himself.
“I’m hoping, as the year goes on, I get to pick his brain a little bit,” Cave said. “Right now, I’m still trying to get comfortable. But as the year goes on, I’d love to talk to him a little bit.
I’ve always had the opportunity in the States to play around or be coached by some incredible players, and I love talking to them about what they thought, what they did, what their approach was, how they went about their day and stuff like that. I’d love to do the same thing with him.” Cave appeared in 123 games for the Colorado Rockies last year, including 83 starts, and batted .
251/.290/.396 with seven homers and 37 RBIs.
Cave said he felt he would have a chance to stay with the Rockies. Instead, he cleared waivers and elected free agency, before signing with the Bears in November. Now 32 years old, Cave said the decision came down to wanting more regular playing opportunity.
“I would have had a chance to probably sign a big league deal later in the offseason and for sure, a minor league deal with somebody,” he said. “But that wasn’t something I was looking to do now being 32. I wanted to know, even if it was going far away, what I’m going to do for the upcoming year.
I still take the game very seriously. The Bears wanted me, and they were actively seeking me out. That felt good, so I just figured it was about that time to make the move.
” Cave said seeing more offspeed pitches than he’d been accustomed to in the United States — even six in a row at one point this spring — and facing pitchers with funky deliveries has been a big part of his adjustment process. Ultimately, though, “it’s all baseball,” he said. “It’s cool, though.
Anything different is a challenge, but I like that,” Cave added. “That was part of the reason why I wanted to come over here. I knew it would take some adjusting to, but I wanted to challenge myself.
I believe that I’m good enough to play anywhere, major leagues, KBO, wherever it is. I wanted to see that, and I’m excited to do that.” Joining Cave in his journey are a pair of first-year American pitchers, Zach Logue and Cole Irvin.
After getting subpar performances from their foreign contingent, the Bears cleaned house and signed three new foreign players for this year. And Cave said the three are “learning everything together,” be it the way the game is played in the KBO or the way the subway system works in Seoul. “There’s always that little difference between the pitchers and the position players about what they’re getting ready to do every day and what I’m getting ready to do every day,” Cave said.
“I didn’t know if I was going to be able to talk to these guys that much, but both Zach and Cole are awesome guys, really easy to talk to, and we’re all going through the same thing. So that helps.” (Yonhap).
