Hyeseong Kim figures to have a clear path to a role as the Dodgers’ regular second baseman after the club traded Gavin Lux to the Reds earlier this winter. Even so, L.A. is keeping their options open with the longtime KBO infielder. According to Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register, the Dodgers are planning to try Kim in center field this spring.
Kim, 26, has played second base for the vast majority of his career but also has significant experience at shortstop alongside fairly brief cameos in the outfield corners and at third base. Kim is already being utilized at both middle infield positions, but now the club appears poised to give Kim opportunities in center as well in the hope that he can provide them with a left-handed option at the position. Switch-hitter Tommy Edman figures to be the club’s starting option at the position this year, but he’s been a far better hitter against left-handed pitching throughout his career to this point. Other alternatives to Edman like Enrique Hernandez, Chris Taylor, and Andy Pages are all right-handed, while lefty center fielder James Outman appears to have fallen several places down the club’s depth chart at this point.
That creates an opportunity for Kim, who is coming off a .326/.383/.458 season for the KBO’s Kiwoom Heroes. If Kim struggles offensively in his first taste of big league action as his countryman Ha-Seong Kim did during his debut 2021 campaign with the Padres, it’s at least theoretically possible that the Dodgers could eventually opt to utilize veteran infielder Miguel Rojas or even Edman as their regular second baseman, relegating Kim to more of a utility role. If that were to come to pass, Kim having the versatility to handle center field against right-handed pitching would be a major asset for the Dodgers given their heavily right-handed bench and center field options.
Elsewhere on the roster, two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani continues to work towards his return to the mound after missing the 2024 season due to elbow surgery. Plunkett notes that manager David Roberts relayed to reporters that Ohtani touched 95 mph on his heater during today’s bullpen session. That’s a noteworthy development after he oscillated between 92 and 94 mph during last week’s session. Roberts also added that Ohtani incorporated his cutter into the bullpen session today, a change which he described as a “big step.”
The star’s projected timeline for a return to the mound has not changed, as he’s expected to first begin pitching in games sometime in May. Even so, it’s surely encouraging for Dodgers fans that their superstar remains on the right track and is making good progress as he navigates a tricky rehab process that will require him to balance rehabbing his arm as a pitcher and preparing for the regular season as a hitter.
Plunkett also relayed an update on right-hander Bobby Miller, who was struck in the head with a 106mph comebacker during the first Spring Training game between the Dodgers and Cubs on Thursday. Miller appears to have suffered mild symptoms as a result of the incident, previously telling reporters he was only dealing with “headaches and drowsiness.” Even so, Miller won’t be back in games for the Dodgers for a while yet. He relayed to Plunkett that he’s “got to pass some steps” before being cleared to resume baseball activities, and the first box that needs to be checked is for Miller to be completely symptom-free before he resumes workouts and eventually returns to games. Miller is in the mix for the fifth starter job to open the season, but both Tony Gonsolin and Dustin May appeared to be more likely candidates for the job entering Spring Training.
Sorry all but Go Dodgers. : )
Your user name just cut me down going 1st to 3rd.
And take the Lakers with you.
Does anybody know how the errant ball managed to tag Miller ? Was it fouled off a bat into the dugout on a line or something? Had to have been a scary scene.
It was a 106 mph line drive off the bat of Michael Busch that hit Miller on the right forehead.
And the ball ricocheted off Miller’s head and went all the way to the wall behind the plate.
He’s one tough guy. He deserves to be the Dodgers fifth starter for walking away from that shot.
Muller is tough but he will have some catching up to do to supplant Gonsolin or May. He had a tough road even before the comebacker.
Wow. I don’t want to see the replay given that I was right behind the dugout when Alex Cobb was hit in the side of the head by a line drive. It was a sickening sound. At the time, we assumed he would never play again. With so little reaction time, I’m surprised how few pitchers are beaned annually.
*Miller*
Dave Roberts said Manny Machado threw it at him – LOL!
Any time you have to laugh at your own joke should be a sign that it wasn’t funny.
Or it could just have been a way to show you didn’t mean it seriously?
Or, that it just wasn’t funny.
Or it could be “to each his own”. If you don’t think it’s funny choose not to laugh. What makes you want to start an argument. Feelings hurt?
Now, that’s funny!
I’ll weigh in on this : just fundamentally not funnny
He was pitching and it was hit straight back at his head at 106 MPH.
2nd question: Does anybody know if Kim can be sent to AAA if he struggles? Thnx.
Yes Kim has options and can be sent to minors.
Yes, but I’d be shocked if that happened right out of spring training. The plan has to be to expose him to big-league pitching for at least a few weeks and only send him down if it looks like he really needs some adjustments.
I agree. I was not suggesting otherwise. I merely answered the option question.
I wouldn’t be shocked, if he has a seriously bad spring training. If you can’t hit pitching from 40+ rosters, you’re likely not ready for pitching from the 26. What was surprising was signing him and trading Lux.
He has not looked good at the plate so far, or in the field. At this point I would rather have Pages to at least start the season.
3 freaking games and you are indicting the kid. talk to us in 2 weeks. the odds of Pages making the team over Kim are tiny.
Have you seen Kim play defense up the middle? If he can have close to an average bat….
stymeedone
Trading Lux wasn’t at all surprising.
He’s a platoon bat virtually unplayable against lefties, and a merely OK second baseman with zero defensive versatility. If you want to remain on the Dodgers’ 26-man, the bat and the glove both needed to be far better.
He ran into some tough luck in LA, and it didn’t help that he was overrated prior to getting there. But he had some nice moments, and came up big a couple times in the WS-title run.
But what was done is what had to be done.
Pages played a key role in the world series winning team last year.
It’s not so much Kim’s shortcomings that bother me, but rather leaving a player as talented as Pages off the roster.
I would like to see pages to be platooned with Conforto.
Rojas is also amazing up the middle.
Same with Kike, Mookie looks really good, and Chris Taylor is also a serviceable middle infielder.
We don’t need Kim just for his glove, he needs to prove he can hit.
What a difference 5 days makes. Now the talk around Camelback is Kim starts the season in AAA unless he finds his stroke over the remainder of ST.
My guess is gonsolin will be 5th starter.
Next yr when may is a FA, knack will an important part of either the BP or rotation
Knack is a depth piece now and will likely remain that way. The entire rotation for this year will be back for 2026 as well.
Not to mention guys like Stone and River Ryan, who both pitched better than Knack last year.
Good news for Miller. That looked scary
In hockey, the rule of thumb for a concussion is (or was) you not only have to be symptom-free, you have to be symptom-free for as long as you had symptoms. Of course in hockey you get hit regularly.
Anthony Rizzo should be a cautionary tale that folks shouldn’t take concussions lightly. He was never the same after what seemingly looked like a minor thing.
Though it did give him amazing scientific powers of analysis, throwing consensus to the wind in favor of his astute observations.
Can the Dodgers sent Kim to the OKC?
Yessir
yes. a very possible outcome in short term, I suspect.
Heavy NL favorites
First of all, wish Miller well. I have seen too many of those in my playing days, both at bat and on the mound, not to mention as an observer.
It is tougher to get back out there than people think. Hard to overcome your human instinct after going through that.
If the Dodgers harness Ohtani’s two-way ability to the fullest, they won’t just control the game—they’ll force the league to rewrite its understanding of roster optimization and player development, creating a new paradigm where the role of “dual-threat” becomes the standard, not the exception.