The conclusion of the contract termination dispute between Goyang Sono and Kim Min-wook was eventually obscured in court.
KBL announced on the morning of the 20th that the mediation was not established after deliberating on the contract dispute between Sono and Kim Min-wook at the 30th 7th Finance Committee held at the KBL Center in Gangnam-gu, Seoul.
A KBL official said, “We tried to reach an agreement between the two sides, but no agreement was reached,” adding, “It is now the domain of the judiciary to argue for the validity of terminating the contract.”
Kim Min-wook was embroiled in suspicions of “school violence” when he was in college, and the club notified Kim Min-wook of the termination of the contract on the 10th.
Sono and Kim Min-wook’s contract remains about a year and a half until May 2026, and their annual salary is reported to be just over 200 million won.
Upon announcing the termination of the contract, Sono paid his monthly salary in December on a daily basis until the 10th. However, Kim Min-wook did not agree to terminate the contract, which led to the opening of the current finance committee.
Kim Min-wook is confronting the past school violence, saying that it cannot be a reason for termination of the contract.
According to the participants of the Finance Committee, Sono’s plan to pay Kim Min-wook all of the remaining salaries during the adjustment process and the plan to pay the remaining salaries this season was discussed, but Sono did not accept it.
“If Kim Min-wook’s side goes to the lawsuit, we will respond legally,” said Hwang Myung-ho, director of Sono, who attended the finance committee.
Kim Min-wook also attended with his lawyer and explained his position at the Finance Committee.
He left the KBL center without answering questions such as “Do you intend to apologize to juniors who claim damage from school violence?”
Kim Min-wook’s lawyer, Kim Ga-ram, said, “Kim Min-wook has not committed any wrongdoing to be terminated, so he rejected the club’s offer to terminate the contract. Today’s adjustment was also requested by the club, and the club’s adjustment proposal was to terminate the contract without paying the salary, but the player only refused it,” and added, “The player has not yet been notified of the club’s official position and is waiting for it.”
The incident erupted when a revelatory post was posted on the Internet community that Kim Min-wook had committed harsh acts in the sports department during his college years. 먹튀검증
The Sports Ethics Center is investigating the matter, and KBL concluded that it had no authority to investigate the incident before entering the professional league.
Meanwhile, Kim Min-wook admitted some of the suspicions in a media interview, saying, “When I was abused for my junior, I got angry and let the junior lie on his stomach and then hit him with ice hockey on the rooftop.”
Sono notified Kim Min-wook of the termination of the contract in accordance with the clause that the club could terminate the contract if it caused a social stir or tarnished the team’s image, but when Kim Min-wook did not agree, the club asked the KBL to hold a financial committee.
According to the KBL regulations, a club must obtain consent from a player when terminating a contract. Coincidentally, Kim Min-wook is also a victim of a case in which former coach Kim Seung-ki resigned last month after assaulting a player in a locker room.
Former coach Kim received a two-year suspension at the KBL Finance Committee held on the 29th of last month.
In order to disobey the disciplinary action of the Financial Services Commission, a request for reconsideration must be made within 15 days. Former coach Kim did not request a reconsideration, and the disciplinary action was confirmed.
