Lions stymied by Eagles' top bullpen weapon again as fatigue sets in

Samsung Lions starter Ariel Jurado walks off the mound after completing the top of the seventh inning of Game 3 of the second-round series in the Korea Baseball Organization postseason against the Hanwha Eagles at Daegu Samsung Lions Park in the southeastern city of Daegu, Tuesday. Yonhap

For the second time in three games of the ongoing Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) postseason series, the Samsung Lions were kept in check by one overpowering weapon out of the Hanwha Eagles' bullpen Tuesday night — this after knocking around an opposing starter for the third straight game.

The Lions dropped Game 3 of the best-of-five series by 5-4 at Daegu Samsung Lions Park in the southeastern city of Daegu, and they scored all four of their runs off the Eagles' starter, Ryu Hyun-jin.

In Game 1, the Lions scored six runs in six innings off Cody Ponce, the regular-season Triple Crown winner as the KBO leader in wins, ERA and strikeouts, though they lost the game 9-8. Then in the next game, the Lions chased starter Ryan Weiss after only four innings by putting up five runs on the board en route to a 7-3 victory.

But the Lions, who topped the regular season with 161 homers and a .780 on-base plus slugging, have not been able to solve Moon Dong-ju, the starter-turned-reliever who has been blowing one fastball after another by these helpless hitters.

Moon struck out four in two shutout innings in Game 1 and threw a fastball at 161.6 kph, the hardest pitch by anyone in the KBO in 2025.

Moon then punched out six in four more scoreless frames Tuesday, and even though his fastball topped out at 157 kph and sat around the low 150s, the Lions batters still couldn't catch up to that pitch.

The Lions, flexing their home run muscle again, belted two home runs Tuesday, but they came off a changeup and a curveball from Ryu. The Lions' inability to attack Moon's fastballs could be attributed to fatigue accumulated over their postseason.

As the No. 4 seed, the Lions started their postseason in the wild card round, where they needed two games to knock out the fifth-seed NC Dinos. Then they played the No. 3 seed SSG Landers in the next stage and eliminated them in four games played over a six-day span.

After three days of rest — one extra day afforded by a rainout — the Lions began the new series against the well-rested Eagles, who earned a bye to this round by virtue of being the No. 2 seed.

Fatigue might also have been a factor for the Lions' Game 3 starter, Ariel Jurado, who didn't have his usual command of pitches while allowing five runs on nine hits in seven innings. Jurado gave up just one run in 14 regular-season innings against the Eagles this year.

The workhorse right-hander led all pitchers with 197 1/3 innings this year and had added 14 innings during the postseason before Tuesday.

Before Tuesday's game, Lions veteran Ryu Ji-hyuk said he felt playing this many games over a relatively short stretch benefited his team because the players could stay sharp and treat these as regular-season games, not postseason contests.

Despite Ryu's claim, though, the Lions might finally have hit the wall. The KBO's postseason bracket is set up to favor teams with better regular-season records -- the top seed LG Twins received a bye to the Korean Series and are awaiting the winner of this series -- and there's a reason no fourth seed has ever won a championship.

Only four times has a No. 4 seed even reached the Korean Series, and all of them did so before the wild card round was added in 2015.