Chae Eun-seong (34), the captain of the Hanwha Eagles, led the team’s come-from-behind victory by making his former team the LG Twins cry. He made a critical hit by making an excellent use of LG’s defense system with a fake bunt and slash.
Chae Eun-sung started as the fifth batter’s first baseman at a home game against LG in the 2024 Shinhan SOL Bank KBO League held at Hanwha Life Eagles Park in Daejeon on the 14th, and led Hanwha to a 9-5 come-from-behind victory by posting two hits and one RBI from four times at bat, including its 17th home run of the season. Hanwha, which had six runs and a big inning in the bottom of the eighth inning alone, recently lost three consecutive games and set up an opportunity to turn the mood around.
At the top of the first and second innings, Hanwha gave up four runs due to a series of defensive errors, thereby disrupting the flow of the game to LG. However, Chae Eun-seong’s bat swung sharply from the first batter’s box in the bottom of the second inning. He hit a 149-km-per-hour fastball driven in the middle of the first pitch by LG’s foreign pitcher Elijah Hernandez to hit the ball over the left fence. With his 130-meter fly ball and 17th homer for this season, he marked his counterattack from the beginning.
He was then struck out by Hernandez’s slider in the bottom of the fourth inning, and hit a fastball well toward his body in the sixth inning with one out, but headed straight to the third baseman. He swallowed his disappointment by playing a 5-4-3 double play, but changed the mood with an exquisite hit that served as a stepping stone for the tie at his last at-bat in the bottom of the eighth inning.
In the bottom of the eighth inning, Hanwha followed with a 4-5 leadoff hitter Moon Hyun-bin’s walk and Kim Tae-yeon’s RBI double to the right-center field, which led to Noh Si-hwan’s walk, Chae held the bat in half and performed a bunt motion. Since manager Kim Kyung-moon’s inauguration, Chae’s fake bunt and slash has increased remarkably at the first and second bases with no outs, but the cause of death came when Chae took the batter’s box on the day as well. LG’s infield also prepared by using forward defense.
When LG pitcher Kim Young-joon’s slider at the first pitch came into his body, Chae Eun-seong changed the direction of the pitch as expected. While holding the bat short, he consciously pushed the ball between the first and second bases, and fell to the right. He added runners at first and second bases one by one. In the process, Noh Si-hwan, a first baseman who passed the second base to go to the third base, and Kim Tae-yeon, a second baseman who stopped at the third base, overlapped. The run could have cut off due to running base, but when LG’s defense missed the gap, Kim Tae-yeon quickly turned home again and scored a point. Chae Eun-seong placed a stepping stone with the score tied at 5-5.
With runners on the first and third bases loaded with no outs, third baseman Noh Si-hwan dug in, and Hanwha came from behind to turn the game 6-5. Chae Eun-seong, who advanced to second base, rushed through third base when Lee Won-seok had a hit that fell to the left of center field. He scored valuable additional points through headfirst sliding. Then, Hanwha, which had Jang Jin-hyuk’s RBI double to the right and Lee Do-yoon’s RBI single to the left, made a six-run big inning to come from behind to win the game 9-5.
After the game, Chae Eun-sung said, “All the players didn’t give up and tried to create a situation. Those minds were able to come together and win one by one. The atmosphere was not good when the error came out at the beginning of the game, but the score difference was not big. I thought we could just follow each point,” he said, expressing his feelings after winning the come-from-behind victory. 메이저사이트
The hit made by a fake bunt and slash in the bottom of the eighth inning was crucial. Since manager Kim Kyung-moon’s inauguration, Chae Eun-sung has been doing particularly well, but there were many hits mainly made by pulling to the left. On the other hand, on the day, a hit came out to the right, which was consciously aimed at. LG shortstop Oh Ji-hwan and third baseman Koo Bon-hyuk were caught off guard due to their wide range of defense.
“I know it because I’ve been with LG, but shortstop and third baseman defense are very good,” Chae said. “You have to wrap up strongly when you slash, but since you do so much these days, opponents don’t usually give you fastballs from the first pitch. I hit a breaking ball again today, but I wanted to hit it right (opposite third baseman and shortstop), and luckily the result came out,” Chae said. “We know each other’s styles and tendencies well. It’s fun to play while studying how to play against each other.”
Chae, who joined LG in 2009, has played for nine seasons through 2022 since his debut in the first team in 2014. After moving to the FA, he showed weak performance in 16 games against LG last year with a batting average of 180 (11 hits in 61 at-bats) with two homers, four RBIs and an OPS of .549, but has displayed robust performance in 11 games with a batting average of .40 (16 hits in 40 at-bats) with four homers and 13 RBIs. Overcoming his inferiority in performance, Hanwha is also gaining a narrow advantage against LG this year with six wins and five losses overall.
In the first half, Chae, who had a batting average of 232 (55 hits in 237) and six homers and 38 RBIs in 64 games, made a complete recovery with a batting average of 3336 (36 hits in 107 times at bat) and 11 homers and 34 RBIs in 27 games in the second half of the year, recorded an OPS of 1.127. Along with Kang Min-ho (Samsung), he is tied for first in homers in the second half, while he is the lone top scorer in RBIs. On top of that, he is leading the Hanwha lineup by displaying top-notch performance in the league by ranking second in slugging percentage and third in OPS. Amid Chae’s revival, the ninth-ranked Hanwha Eagles has continued to keep up hope for fall baseball, trailing fifth-ranked SSG by 4.5 games.
“I had a hard time as a captain due to various reasons due to poor performance in the team,” Chae said. “However, I did not intend to resign. I didn’t want to let someone else take the helm. Even if I can’t do it anyway, I want to stay responsible until the end,” he added. “I did so poorly when it mattered. I should have done better when the team needed to advance. Still, the season is not over yet, so I have to finish it. Our goal now is to reach the top five.”