The main man Choi Joon-suk does his thing.
First:
Incheon (SK) 5-1
Back on top with timely hitting and resurgence of Kim Gwang-hyun. Swept (though an over rated) Kia Tigers and made good work of the Heroes except for an 4-11 embarrassment last Thursday. This machine of a team has no one dominant batter with a different player leading in each category and but it is mostly Kim Gwang-hyun carrying the pitching. Ken Katokura's surging start to the season has Katokura leading at some categories but it is Kim that's the definite ace of this team (under 1.80 ER's in last 4 starts). This team's W-L pretty much sums up the rest.
Second:
Seoul (Doosan) 3-2
Swept LG and split the rain shortened series with Nexen. Winning but inconsistent again. Hitting coming along great with an over 286 team batting average in all games but one this week, but pitching's becoming a problem letting in 5, 6, or 9 runs in most games this week. Yesterday's 2-1 tight win over Heroes was the only game like that this week. Better learn to stop letting games get out of hand over here. PS Choi Joon-suk is still the man hitting 355 and 81 hits. Only Lotte's fat boys are hitting harder than this main man.
Third:
Another successful (for Kia standards) week for the defending champs. Sweep a series, get sweeped, it all evens out, let's go for some soju. Blew out Hanhwa beating them by 6 or 7 runs, but then hit a wall against SK. Hung tough for most of game 1 of this week's SK series but wasn't all that surprising when SK knocked in 3 in their half of the last to win with a walk off. That happens with teams that are content. But something else happens to teams that are content, they don't repeat. Kia's encore for the series was losing by 6 and getting shut out in their next two games. Good luck in October red.
Fourth:
Daegu (Samsung) 3-3
Ranked last last week with a 2-4, Samsung's getting back on track with a 500 record for this week. Split and lost their two series' this week. Lotte's a tough team to play these days and still hung on for a series split with that insanely frustrating tie on Thursday. Their big 7-2 loss in the first game in the Hanhwa series was actually split pretty evenly between the two teams in terms of stats. They were even in pretty much everything but the score. The score's obviously the most important stat, but hanging in in a game like this commendable. Oh yeah, and pitching's turning into a major problem over here with Brandon Knight turning into the team's "ace" with a 5-5 4.46 (lame).
Fifth:
Seoul (LG) 3-3
Won and lost their two series this week but let in a ton of runs. Turning things around over here but there's only so much you can do. LG let in 46 runs this week. That's quite a lot of runs. Looks like a basketball score. Team batting has been improving but it's still just Lee Dae-young reaching base safely in good numbers. Lee's got 87 hits (3rd in league) but only 33 RBI's. A lot of runners are being left stranded. There are no Twins anywhere near the top of RBI, HR, or even slugging or or on-base categories. 6th in the league and that's where this team will stay for the rest of the season.
Sixth:
Busan (Lotte) 2-4
Pitching has been and still is a problem over here. Couldn't hold a lead on Saturday giving up 2 runs in the 8th, giving up 15 hits and 7 runs to LG on Thursday, giving up 4 runs in extras to Samsung on Wednesday, and so on. Ryan Sadowski's really turned into the ace of this team and is doing very well in terms of wins. But he is neck and neck for team's lowest ERA with Lee Jae-gon with 4.08 and 4.01 respectively. And these two homies are the only pitchers with ERA's anywhere near 4 on this pitching staff. Lotte's fat bats are still cruising, but I wonder if this team has hit rock bottom in terms of pitching.
Seventh:
Daejeon (Hanhwa) 2-4
Did win the Samsung series 2 games to 1 and kept Samsung's respectable bats to 2 runs in both of those wins. Ryu Hyun-jin is still pitching exceptionally well, but less than what he was doing for a few weeks before. He's actually lost his last 2 starts. Fortunately he's being relieved these days after 6 or 7 innings, people are afraid that his arm will let up and I hope that he can hang around with this team until things turn around. Actually, I really want to see Ryu in the majors but that's a completely different thing. Some of Hanhwa's hotter bats have quieted down and you will see no orange in any batting category besides home runs where Choi Jin-heng leads the way with 20.
Eighth:
Seoul (Nexen) 2-4
Got some company in the rankings and standings as team above is tied with Nexen for last. Abysmal 397 winning percentages in North American major league sports will have fans in a rage GM's making desperation moves. But in Korea, it's fun Mr. Chin and happy fans screaming 'it's OKAY!" at Nexen games. Yeah, a good time at the ball park but no one's going to win any games, well, I guess the other team will win games. Let's see some moves over here, send Bae Him-chang and Burnside to Doosan for Ko Young-min and a reliever. Complaining about our awful NHL teams is actually most of the fun being a Canadian sports fan and I actually feel sorry for Korean Nexen/Hanhwa fans who are so nice and forgiving they're going to let these teams go "fighting" and keep losing because "it's okay."
No comments:
Post a Comment