Yang Eui-ji wins Korean Series MVP
Yang Eui-ji, center, of the Doosan Bears, celebrates with his teammates after claiming the MVP award for the Korea Baseball Organization’s Korean Series at Masan Baseball Stadium in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province, Wednesday. / Yonhap
Doosan Bears crowned baseball champions again
By Kang Hyun-kyung
Doosan Bears’ catcher Yang Eui-ji ascended to the Korean Series Most Valuable Player Award Wednesday following his team’s championship title win.
Yang is the second catcher in the history of the Korean Baseball Organization (KBO) to win the MVP award in the final postseason series since 1991 when Jang Che-geun of the now defunct Haitai Tigers was honored.
On Wednesday, the Bears were crowned again with four straight wins in the best-of-seven Korean Series after their 8-1 win against the NC Dinos in Game 4.
Bear’s catcher Yang, 29, was thankful for his fellow pitchers’ support in winning the championship series.
“I think our pitchers are so great that our team would have made it even with any other catcher, instead of me, behind home plate,” he said after winning the MVP award.
Yang named each of the four starting pitchers -- Dustin Nippert, Jang Won-jun, Michael Bowden and Yu Hui-kwan all of whom he had caught in Games 1, 2, 3 and 4 -- for their great pitching and said he would not have been able to win the award without them.
This year was his best year since 2010 when he first played in the KBO as a catcher. During the regular season, he produced 22 home runs with a batting average of .319. His performance during the Korean Series was even better. He had 7 hits out of 16 at-bats with four runs batted in and a batting average of .438.
Bears’ manager Kim Tae-hyung lauded Yang for his decisive role in the Bears’ win in the series, calling him “a seasoned catcher quick on the uptake.”
“Great pitchers make great catchers,” Kim said. “If the pitching is not great, the catcher will be in trouble. Poor pitching makes it harder for the catcher to call pitches.”
Yang’s chubby face and smart ordering of pitches earned him the nickname of “a fox in the guise of a bear.”
His winning the MVP award was considered long overdue. Along with Lotte Giants’ Kang Min-ho, Yang is cited as one of the two greatest pitchers in the KBO.
However, for some reason his role for his team was underappreciated.
Yang remained an unsung hero partly because of the nature of his position as catcher. In baseball, catchers play an extensive role and for this reason, some call them on-field leaders.
Catchers are responsible for calling pitches and reacting to all situations happening on the field. The demanding job requires catchers to hone their leadership skills, as well as a certain level of ability to read the minds of the rival team’s batters. Some say great catchers are psychologists.
Like Yang, competent catchers call for varied pitches to make it harder for the batters to predict what kinds of pitches will come next.
Because of the key role they play on the field, catchers can make or break a team’s performance.
However, it’s rare for catchers to steal the show, partly because their roles are not easily appreciated except by the most astute baseball fans.
Yang came into the spotlight because this year’s Korean Series took the form of a competition among pitchers. Yang was behind the great pitching of the four Bears’ pitchers, better known as the “Fantastic Four.” He was the man who ordered them to make the winning pitches.
His role in Game 4 was critical. He had three hits in four at-bats. His single home run in the second inning helped the Bears take a 1-0 lead in the crucial game. He doubled to leftfield and singled to centerfield in the following innings, helping his team score more to crush the Dinos.
The Bears have won the Korean Series five times in total. They are the winners of both the regular season and the Korean Series again in 21 years since the team first did this in 1995.
The Dinos, which advanced to the Korean Series for the first time since the founding of the club four years ago, had struggled in all four games against the Bears. In Game 4, the Dinos scattered hits in scoreless innings. Na Sung-bum and Eric Thames missed opportunities to score in the sixth inning when two Dinos batters were at first and third bases. Na was struck out while Thames grounded out.
Thames’ solo home run in the ninth inning was too late for the Dinos to turn back the tide because of the wide gap in the score. The Bears had led the game 8-0 before his home run.