Koreans Crowd US Open
By Kim Tong-hyung
Staff Reporter
It's been quite a miserable year for some of the biggest names in Korean sports and the news keep getting worse.
The country's four Premier League footballers find themselves riddled with injuries and expecting bit-part roles at their club's next season, should they manage to avoid being shipped out first, with their ``fearsome foursome'' nickname now a running joke.
The Korean Major League Baseball (MLB) player has become an endangered species and the enigmatic Florida Marlins pitcher Kim Byung-hyun, currently the last Korean left in a big league roster, doesn't inspire much hope.
However, when changing the topic to women's professional golf, the story becomes entirely different. The struggles of Korean male athletes in the international stage couldn't provide a starker contrast to the overall dominance of Korean women golfers.
The growing presence of Korean athletes in the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) is best represented by the participant list of the U.S. Women's Open that kicks off Thursday (Korean time) at the Pine Needles Lodge in Southern Pines, North Carolina.
A total of 35 South Korean nationals have qualified for what is considered the most prestigious event in women's golf, now in its 62nd year, accounting for about 30 percent of the 156 players competing in the tournament.
Pak Se-ri, who recently secured a Hall of Fame spot, Kim Mi-hyun, and Grace Park are the biggest names among the Korean golfers, while 19-year-old prospect Shin Ji-yai, who has been tearing up the domestic competition, will get the chance to showcase her skills for the international audience.
Eleven others are Korean-Americans, such as media darling Michelle Wie, or Korean-born players who have since changed citizenship while playing in another country.
They will be competing against the likes of Annika Sorenstam, who is back to defend her title after winning her first U.S. Women's Open in 10 years, current world No. 1 Lorena Ochoa, and other tournament favorites such as Suzann Pettersen and Morgan Pressel.
The oldest among the Korean golfers participating in the tournament is 35-year-old Chung Il-mi, who is 20 years older than the country's youngest player Chang Hana.
The $3.1 million event, which continues through July 1, has the highest purse among LPGA's major championships.
Sixty-eight players were fully exempt into the championship, leaving 87 spaces open in the field for qualifiers, which 1,251 players ended up competing for.
Pak won the U.S. Women's Open in 1998 and Birdie Kim won the title in 2005.