KBO's Lotte Giants hire ex-Mets coach Meinhold

The South Korean baseball club Lotte Giants announced Saturday they've hired former New York Mets assistant pitching coach Ricky Meinhold as their director of pitching.

The Korea Baseball Organization club said the arrival of the 35-year-old completes their staff on the pitching side for 2022.

The Giants said Meinhold will oversee operations and development of their pitching staff at all levels of the organization, from the KBO down to the minors.

Meinhold was not drafted coming out of Drury University and played independent ball before getting into coaching -- first for Coker College and then for the St. Louis Cardinals.

In 2013, he was hired as a minor league scout and coach for the Cardinals' Low-A affiliate, Palm Beach Cardinals. He was later promoted to a professional major league scout and then from 2017 to 2019, he was the Cardinals' pitching development analyst.

While with the Cardinals, Meinhold also helped USA Baseball with its pitching development and evaluation, and then served as the pitching coach for the U.S. national under-18 team in 2017.

He joined the Mets organization in December 2019, first as their minor league pitching coordinator. He started doubling as the big league club's assistant pitching coach in January 2021 but left both positions in September 2021.

The Giants posted the worst ERA among the 10 KBO clubs this past regular season at 5.37. They also gave up the most hits with 1,333, second-most walks with 659 and third-most home runs with 133.

The Giants allowed a .271/.364/.410 line, the worst numbers in the KBO.

They finished seventh in the standings at 65-71-8 (wins-losses-ties) and missed the postseason for the fourth straight year.

(Yonhap)