South Korean pitcher Oh Seung-hwan said Thursday he hopes to keep his mistakes to a minimum as he prepares for his first season in Japan.The new Hanshin Tigers closer left Seoul to join the Nippon Professional Baseball club on Thursday, after spending one day at home to handle administrative matters.Oh, the all-time leader with 277 career saves in the Korea Baseball Organization here, signed a two-year deal with the Tigers in November.Looking tanned and visibly slimmer, the 31-year-old right-han

PARADISE VALLEY, Arizona (AP) ― Ever since the game was invented, before television or even radio existed, baseball counted on the eyes and ears of umpires on the field. Starting this season, many key decisions will be made in a studio far away.Major League Baseball vaulted into the 21st century of technology on Thursday, approving a huge expansion of instant replay in hopes of eliminating blown calls that riled up players, managers and fans.“I think it’s great,” San Francisco Giants manager Bru

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― Pitcher Clayton Kershaw agreed Wednesday to a $215 million, seven-year contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers, a person familiar with the negotiations told the Associated Press, a deal that makes the two-time Cy Young Award winner baseball’s first player with a $30 million average salary.The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the agreement had not yet been announced.Kershaw receives the most lucrative deal for a pitcher, breaking the mark of $180 million set by Just

Major League Baseball (MLB) has requested a status check on South Korean star pitcher Yoon Suk-min, baseball officials here said Tuesday, a formal administrative step before a big league club can sign any professional player from Korea.The Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) said it informed MLB that Yoon is eligible for free agency after being asked about the 28-year-old's status in the top domestic league.The request is the second of its kinds after MLB first tendered a status check to the KBO i

All nine clubs in the top South Korean baseball league will begin their overseas training camps this week, starting their offseason preparation in earnest.The Korea Baseball Organization clubs will all leave the country on Wednesday and spend around 50 days in warmer regions before returning home in early March.Away from the biting winter in South Korea, the three-time defending champs Samsung Lions, along with pitchers and catchers of the Kia Tigers, will set up their camps on the Pacific islan

The top domestic baseball league decided Tuesday to abolish the salary cap imposed on foreign players, a move that followed a series of controversial signings of late.The presidents of teams in the Korea Baseball Organization agreed to get rid of the $300,000 salary cap in their board meeting.The KBO clubs have increasingly faced allegations that they hadn’t been honoring the salary cap and that they were paying their foreign players more money under the table, bringing into question the effecti

After his team won the past three South Korean baseball titles in a row, Ryu Joong-il, manager of the Samsung Lions, said the club is ready for a fresh start.The Lions held their inaugural meeting of 2014 at their training facility in Gyeongsan, North Gyeongsang Province, about 330 kilometers southeast of Seoul. Afterward, Ryu told reporters the Lions will face a crossroads in the 2014 Korea Baseball Organization season.“When a team at the top stays complacent, then it’s bound to take a fall,” t

NEW YORK (AP) ― Alex Rodriguez’s drug suspension was cut to 162 games from 211 by arbitrator Fredric Horowitz, a decision the New York Yankees third baseman vowed to fight in federal court.Rodriguez also would be sidelined for any postseason games this year under the ruling announced Saturday.“The number of games sadly comes as no surprise, as the deck has been stacked against me from day one,” Rodriguez said in a statement. “This is one man’s decision, that was not put before a fair and imparti

A recent decision by the Korea Baseball Organization to add an extra roster spot for foreign players starting in 2014 will likely have a positive impact on the quality of play in the top-flight domestic league, three veteran pitchers from overseas say.Previously, the KBO teams were allowed to sign up to two imports. From 2014, they will be permitted to put a maximum of three players on their active rosters, and have two of them play at the same time. The maximum number is four for the expansion

General managers of the teams in the top South Korean baseball league on Tuesday discussed potential rule changes for the upcoming season, including tweaking the current free agency system.The officials of the 10 teams in the Korea Baseball Organization held their first executive committee meeting on Tuesday. The nine current teams were joined by the KT Wiz, which will enter the KBO in 2015.The officials discussed allowing clubs to sign free agent players returning from overseas leagues to multi

South Korean baseball club Nexen Heroes announced on Monday they've reached a strategic partnership agreement with the reigning World Series champion Boston Red Sox.The Seoul-based Korea Baseball Organization team said its president, Lee Jang-seok, met with Allard Baird, vice president of player personnel for the Red Sox, in the South Korean capital on Sunday to ink their deal.The Heroes noted that this is Boston's first strategic partnership with an Asian pro club.Under the partnership, the Red

The Kia Tigers in the top domestic baseball league announced Thursday they've signed former Japanese league ace D.J. Houlton.The Korea Baseball Organization club said the 34-year-old American right-hander signed a one-year deal worth $250,000, along with a signing bonus of $50,000.Houlton pitched sparingly for the Los Angeles Dodgers in Major League Baseball, but he's best known for his success in Nippon Professional Baseball, first with the SoftBank Hawks in the Pacific League and later with th