Korean baseball league begins

By Yoon Chul

The Korean baseball league, the most popular professional sport in Korea, starts its 30th season, Saturday.

Since the league’s opening game between Samsung Lions and MBC Blue Dragon, a predecessor of the LG Twins, in 1982, the sport has developed hugely.

Granted, it is not as big as Major League Baseball (MLB) of the United States or Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) in Japan but the Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) has proved itself with Korea winning gold at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and finishing second in the second World Baseball Classic (WBC) in 2007.

Last year the Korean league, attracted 5.92 million spectators, more than six million are expected this year for the first time in KBO history.

Wyverns, Bears favorites

Defending champions the SK Wyverns and third ranked Doosan Bears are the favorites for the top spot with the Samsung Lions, the Lotte Giants and the Kia Tigers also expected to last until the end.

Though the Wyverns struggled in spring training games they are strong contenders for the No. 1 spot.

In spring training starting pitchers Kim Kwang-hyun, who had the most wins last season with 17, and Song Eun-bum proved to be the best among the eight teams’ rotations.

Catcher Park Kyung-wan, described as half the team’s power, didn’t appear in the spring games, with Kim and other starters failing to overwhelm the batters.

Park is now recovering after surgery on his right achilles tendon and is expected to miss the beginning of the season.

To overcome this period without Park, lefty ace Kim’s solid pitching is essential.

But many experts predict the Wyverns to come out on top because of the motivating talent of manager Kim Sung-kun.

He has trained his side hard for this season and always finds weaknesses in the other contenders to exploit.

The Bears has the strongest farm system among eight pro-teams and is desperate to win the Korean Series.

Since the 2007 season, the Bears have always made the final four in the postseason but never held the championship trophy.

The Seoul based team led by Kim Kyung-moon lost to the Wyverns twice in the final and went out in the second round of the playoffs for the last two seasons.

But they have one of the most feared line-ups.

At the top Lee Jong-wook, Ko Young-min and Oh Jae-won are all more than capable of reaching first base and stealing second.

The clean-up trio of Kim Dong-joo, Choi Joon-seok and Kim Hyun-soo has the arsenal to see the runners to home plate.

The last piece of the puzzle is the starters. They don’t have a star pitcher. Last season import Kelvin Jimenez led the rotation with a 14-5 record with 3.32 ERA, but the Dominican has since moved to the NPB.

The Bears have acquired Dustin Nippert, a 2.03-meter tall American who has performed well and is expected to collect over 10 victories.

The Bears boss also had another import pitcher Ramon Ramirez but he stumbled during the spring training games and fell to the second-tier team.

But the fans also expect new faces that have come through the best farm system, as in previous years.

The Giants and the Lions have new managers in Yang Seung-ho and Ryu Joong-il and they will look to challenge the Wyverns and Bears.

The Giants have won the spring training games for three consecutive years and they have one of the most powerful line-ups with Lee Dae-ho, Hong Sung-heon, Cho Sung-hwan and Kang Min-ho.

Their rotation may be slightly better than the Bears thanks to Song Seung-joon, Jang Won-joon and Lee Jae-kon. But the new boss still needs to find a reliable closer, as his bullpen is weaker than Doosan’s.

The Lions have the strongest bullpen. The team was 58-2 in games they led going into the sixth inning last season and it will be a winning formula for the Lions again thanks to closer Oh Seung-hwan, Kwon Hyuk and Kwon Oh-joon.

However the team’s line-up and rotation is weaker than the other top candidates for the title.

The Tigers have the most powerful rotation of Yoon Suk-min, Yang Hyun-jong and Aquilino Lopez but the 2009 champions are looking to strengthen a line-up that boasts slugger Choi Hee-seop and Kim Sang-hyun.

The team’s batters have power but they often fail to score with runners on base.

The LG Twins is the toughest team to predict. It’s obvious they have power with 12 home runs and 68 RBIs in 13 spring training games but their clean-up trio let them down. The club has reinforced the mound with new imports Benjamin Jukich and Radhames Liz, whose fastball is over 160 kilometers per hour.

The Hanwha Eagles, who have the league’s best pitcher in Ryu Hyun-jin and have re-built the team and the Nexen Heroes will want to avoid battling it out for the wooden spoon.

Players

Which match-ups are fans most looking forward to?

Among them is the potential clash between two lefty aces, Ryu Hyun-jin of the Hanwha Eagles and Kim Kwang-hyun of the SK Wyverns.

But it probably won’t happen as Ryu is a likely source of victory for his team and probably won’t be deployed against the league’s best team and its star pitcher.

Instead attention is turning to whether either pitcher can record 20 victories.

Last season Ryu, who had the best ERA and most strikeouts with 1.82 and 187 in 192 2/3 innings had 16 wins in 25 games.

But his appearances on the mound were limited due to fatigue.

To throw fewer pitches Ryu improved his curve ball and that could help him achieve 20 wins despite being on a weaker team.

Kim’s pitching is spotty and for the start of the season the Wyverns will be without veteran catcher Park Kyung-wan due to injury.

If the Wyverns hurler gets off to a good start he will be on course for the 20-win mark.

Yoon Suk-min of the Kia Tigers is another contender to achieve this feat.

Yoon is seen as the most consistent righty and has a good fastball as well as various breaking balls including a new fork ball.

In the 29-year-old KBO history only 11 pitchers have over 20 wins in a season on 15 occassions. After the pitchers role was split just four pitchers have achieved it since 1990 and only former Doosan Bears import Daniel Rios has more than 20 victories in the past decade.

Will Lee Dae-ho send the ball over the fence more than 50 times?

Last season, Lotte Giants slugger Lee Dae-ho set remarkable records.

Lee hit home runs in nine consecutive games for the first time in professional baseball history in the world and clinched the top spot in seven of eight offensive categories with .364 batting average, 44 homers and 133 RBIs. The lone category that the 130-kilogram slugger failed to snatch the title in was steals.

It was the first time for anyone to hit more than 40 homers in seven years. In 2003 then Samsung Lions slugger Lee Seung-yeop hit 56 dingers, the highest number in a season in Asia.

Lee has already said that he is looking to hit more than 50 homers again and fans are eagerly awaiting the chance to catch his 50th.

New record

The KBO’s 30th season is composed of 532 games ― 133 for each of the eight teams.

The KBO saw a record-breaking last season and hopes the 2011 one will continue in the same vein.

LG Twins fans will be waiting to see if Lee Dae-hyung, dubbed “Super sonic,” can steal 60 bases for a fourth consecutive year for the first time in KBO history.

Even if he fails to set that record he still has the chance to be the only batter to steal over 50 bases for four straight years.

Lee Jong-bum of the Kia Tigers, the closest batter to a .400 batting average in his heyday, stole 84 bases in 1994 with .393 batting average.

Oh Seung-hwan, the Samsung Lions closer will be looking for his 200th save. So far only Kim Yong-soo of the LG Twins and Koo Dae-sung of the Hanwha Eagles have earned that distinction with 227 and 213 respectively.

The Lions closer only needs 35 more. During the last two seasons he struggled and missed a number of games due to injury but this season Oh seems to be fit and raring to go.

In his first three seasons the 28-year-old had 47 saves in 2006, 40 in 2007 and 39 in 2008.

The Lions, one of the original six KBO teams in 1982, are expected to win their 2,000th game, which would be another first in Korean baseball history.

The team needs 68 wins to reach the milestone. For the last 10 years the Lions have won more than 68 times on seven occasions.

Perfect game
The 29-year-old KBO has not been around as long as Major League Baseball (134 years) or Nippon Professional Baseball (76 years).

But the Korean professional baseball league has developed quickly, narrowing the gap between the more established nations.

The one thing the KBO really wants to see is a perfect game.

While Koreans have never seen it on home soil the MLB has witnessed 20 perfect games, and the NPB 16.

A perfect game is a game completed by one pitcher without a runner reaching base either by hit, walk or error. It's one of the rarest feats in baseball and a subset of no-hitters.