The 'Cervical Ball' that destroyed KT, the 'Great Steal Party', now the next target is Kang Min-ho... Does Samsung also get it back?
The 'Cervical Ball' that destroyed KT, the 'Great Steal Party', now the next target is Kang Min-ho... Does Samsung also get it back?
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Yeom Kyung-yeop is a representative coach who preached the importance of operational baseball from the beginning of his leadership career. He sometimes presents bold baseball, but running baseball is also the backbone of his leadership career. Since joining LG, he has become more inclined to play baseball.
Manager Yeom emphasizes that such an image can have a side effect as well as baseball, which disperses the opponent's attention while continuing to steal bases. It can induce opponent's errors and force LG batters to mix the ball in their favor. He emphasizes that this is an invisible effect. In fact, the ratio of fastball use by opposing teams against LG in 2022 was below the league average, but last year it was the highest in the league.
Despite numerous failures, Yeom does not defeat his theory. While he was burdened by winning the Korean Series last year, he also ranked second in the league with 171 team steals this year. He does not hesitate to give instructions at a time when he uses a pinch runner at a match point and everyone knows the operation.
LG achieved great results in the semi-playoff. LG stole as many as 12 teams in five semi-playoff games. It was the largest number of stolen bases by a specific team in the history of the semi-playoff. Of course, there were cases where the team failed, but there were a number of cases where the game was unraveled by successful stealing and inducing the opponent team to make mistakes.
KT, the opponent of the semi-playoff, was a team that had weaknesses in blocking stolen bases. While the gap in skills between the main catcher and the backup catcher was quite large, Jang's rate of blocking stolen bases was low at 14.9% this year. While giving up 97 stolen bases, he stopped only 17 times. It should be said that LG penetrated those weaknesses relatively well in the semi-playoff, and that it achieved its own results even when the opponent's checks were severe.
Then, how about the playoffs? There is little chance that manager Yeom will give up baseball games in which LG plays during his tenure. Since the two teams compete with each other at full capacity in the post season and big games, the probability of a multi-score game is relatively low, and if so, a gap of one base could make a big difference. Between Daegu and Jamsil, there is only a difference in strategy that suits the stadium's environment.
Samsung's rate of blocking stolen bases is not a very bad one, but it is also not an outstanding one. Kang Min-ho, the main catcher, allowed 72 steals this year, blocking the 22nd inning. The rate of blocking stolen bases is 23.4 percent. Lee Byung-hun, who is likely to keep his home turf in Kang's absence, had a 21.4 percent rate of blocking stolen bases. The figure is much better than those of KT catchers, but it can be judged as a figure worth trying for LG.
On the contrary, Samsung catchers must have confidence in themselves. However, LG had only 18 successful steals from 30 attempts against Samsung during the regular season. The success rate is 60 percent, which is lower than the average during the season. The figure indicates that Samsung responded relatively well by being conscious of LG's running baseball. In particular, Park Hae-min, one of the best runners in the league, failed twice and four times. 안전놀이터
There is also a player that Samsung can play. It is Kim Ji-chan. The lineup is for baseball, which aims for long balls rather than running baseball in general, but Kim Ji-chan is an exception. Kim Ji-chan stole five times against LG this year. He failed only once. This year, Samsung made 11 (73.3 percent) of its 15 attempts to steal bases. In terms of success rate, it was rather higher than LG's. Park Dong-won, the main catcher, had a rate of around 25 percent this year.