The Kansas City Royals’ Biggest Fan Is From South Korea

Sports by Steve Han

by STEVE HAN

When the Kansas City Royals invited their superfan Sung Woo Lee from South Korea, neither the team nor the man himself expected that his 10-day stay would be this special.

The Royals went on an eight-game winning streak since the day Lee landed in Kansas City, a streak which allowed them to overtake the Detroit Tigers for first place in the American League Central. Lee, seeing his favorite team in person for the first time, tossed the ceremonial first pitch at Monday night’s game and has become something of a celebrity amid the outpouring of Midwestern hospitality.

Lee, who has never visited the U.S. before the Royals flew him in last week, traces back his fandom to the early 1990s, when he caught baseball highlights on Korean TV, which aired CNN’s sports news segments every day. Lee told MLB.com the Royals’ “beautiful K” on their hats “caught my eye,” and from then on would lend his unconditional support of the perennially underachieving franchise, which hasn’t made the playoffs since 1985 in the early 1990s after watching baseball.

Thanks to the Internet, Lee became an active member of the Royals’ online community and met local fans in Kansas City. Those locals, who’ve kept in touch with Lee for years, are the ones who launched a campaign to fly him in from Korea with the hashtag #SungWooToKC on Twitter.

“The dude is just diehard, and he never has a bad word to say about us, even when we were at our lowest of our low, and I was just really happy and honored to meet him,” said Royals pitcher Danny Duffy.

Set to return to Korea tomorrow, Lee has been embraced by the Royals community, which welcomed him with customized gifts and barbecue tailgate feasts in his honor.

“That’s just a credit to this whole community, this whole town,” Lee said, according to the Kansas City Star. “It’s just been this giant hug from this town. It’s been viral and insane.”

Up Next
Latest News