"Coach, I’m sorry, but I have to run"... Kim Do-young’s bold bid to shed the ‘injury-prone’ label

[The Financial News] "Just come back healthy, that’s all we ask."
The words Kia Tigers manager Lee Bum-ho and general manager Sim Jae-hak offered to their departing "treasure" Kim Do-young were not about winning a championship or a batting title. All they asked for was his health.
But just before boarding the plane, Kim Do-young’s reply went in the exact opposite direction of the front office’s desperate plea. It was a declaration that he would go full throttle again, ready to send fans’ hearts racing.
On the 9th at Incheon International Airport, there was a grim determination on Kim Do-young’s face as he headed for Saipan, the WBC camp site.
The 2025 season was nothing short of a nightmare for him. Before the glow of his 2024 Most Valuable Player (MVP) award had even faded, he suffered two torn hamstrings. He appeared in only about 30 games. It was a period when the so-called "forgotten prodigy" spent more time in rehab than on the field.

Everyone around him keeps saying, "Please, don’t run anymore," and "It’s enough if you just hit singles." Because of the high risk of his hamstring injury recurring, Kia fans hold their breath even when he sprints hard to first base. In the past, during the Asia Professional Baseball Championship (APBC), he also injured a finger while running the bases and had to go through rehab.
But Kim Do-young shook his head. "Without stealing bases, I’m nothing," he insisted, adding, "I will never hold back or tone down my play out of fear of getting hurt." In effect, he flatly rejected his manager’s call for "safe driving" and threw down a risky gauntlet, vowing not to abandon his baseball instinct — speed.
Kim Do-young said that during his long rehab, the instincts that had been ingrained in his body like a baseball machine faded away. From his hitting mechanics to the smallest habits, the formula that had made him an MVP had been wiped clean from his mind.

He has decided to treat this "blank slate" as an opportunity instead. In his words, "Others may not trust my body, but I trust myself 100 percent," there was even a hint of defiance.
Since August, he has been working out like a man possessed, determined to rebuild the feel for the game he lost, starting from the ground up.
In 2026, Kim Do-young plans to run again. Even as people around him tell him to hit the brakes, he has declared that he will step on the gas.
Whether this becomes the signal flare of a spectacular comeback, or a reckless gamble that leaves fans in tears once more, remains to be seen. As he heads for Saipan, the anxious eyes of Kia Tigers fans are fixed on his back.
jsi@fnnews.com Jeon Sang-il Reporter