By Kwon Mee-yoo
Staff Reporter
Korea Haechi, a Korean baseball team, has joined an independent league in Japan, marking the first time for a Korean team to do so since baseball was introduced to Korea in 1905.
"We will do our best as we represent Korea and we feel we can win the championship," Park Cheol-woo, manager of Korea Haechi and former Haitai Tigers clean-up hitter, said at a kick-off ceremony at Seoul City Hall, Friday.
Korea Haechi will compete in the Kansai Independent Baseball League in Japan from this season.
Led by Park, the team has four former professional players as well as college graduates who were not picked up by first division teams. Some members are Korean-Japanese players who competed in the league last year.
The team initially named themselves Korea Turtle Ships, but due to the possibility that it might stir anti-Korea sentiment in Japan, the team instead thought of Haechi, the imaginary lion-like animal used as Seoul's symbol.
Seoul City allowed them to use Haechi as their team name and the character on their uniform, seeing it as a chance to promote the city and its symbol through baseball.
"It is very unique to have a baseball team with a name such as Haechi playing in a Japanese baseball league," a city official said. "We expect them to show off the high level of Korean baseball in Japan.''
The Kansai Independent League was established in 2009 and is comprised of four teams ― Kobe 9 Cruise, Akashi Red Soldiers, Kishu Rangers and now the Haechi, which will replace the Osaka Gold Villicanes.
It is the third independent league to have been founded in Japan.
The league has some 144 games scheduled throughout the season, which officially starts April 3, and plans to play six games in Seoul. The Korea Haechi will be the home team of Osaka, a city where many Korean-Japanese people live.