Kiwoom, which showed off its formidable potential and strength to advance to the 2022 Korean Series, drew high expectations as it worked hard to strengthen its power ahead of the 2023 season. The 2023 season was the last before Lee Jung-hoo (26, San Francisco), the team’s flagship batter, advanced to the Major League. Many interpreted it as a willingness to perform when Lee Jung-hoo was present.
However, Lee Jung-hoo did not play in many games due to injury, and the acquired players were out of the lineup due to injury and poor performance. Kiwoom ranked at the bottom of the league with 58 wins, 83 losses and 3 draws last year. When Lee Jung-hoo moved to the Major League this year, he showed a more focus on the future. He garnered rookie nomination rights through continuous trade, and this year’s team management seemed to focus on finding future engines.
As a result, the team remained at the bottom of the list for two consecutive years this year. It recorded 58 wins and 86 losses (.403) this year, ranking 10th, four games apart from ninth place NC. At one point in the early days of the season, the team seemed to have been struggling hard, creating a storm in the league, but it was also difficult to easily overcome its inferiority in objective power. Although it can exert efforts for a certain period of time, it has been revealed that it does not have basic physical stamina to play 144 games in the top five.
Despite the weak performance, the team had a winning rate of over 40 percent. Despite its weak performance, the team did not display poor performance. At one point, Kiwoom’s hard work was a barometer of how fierce the league ranking battle will be this season. That is why the two names are regrettable. They are Ahn Woo-jin, a native ace who started his mandatory military service ahead of this season due to elbow surgery, and Ronnie Dawson, a foreign hitter who left the military due to knee injury in the middle and second half of this season.
It was a season that confirmed that it was difficult for new players to grow into main players at once, and that Kiwoom still needed more time. However, assuming that Ahn Woo-jin and Dawson played in this year’s team without injury, Kiwoom may have become a team to compete for the ranking until the end.
Two foreign pitchers (Ariel Furado and Enmanuel de Heysus) performed well for Kiwoom this year. It is no exaggeration to say that they are the best foreigners’ one-two punch in the league in terms of skills and sustainability. On top of that, Ha Young-min achieved better-than-expected performance this year. However, as new players continued to climb and downhill for the remaining two spots, the entire team failed to continue its momentum. While all players in the league were wary of foreign players, younger pitchers used to yield games easily. If Ahn Woo-jin, the best pitcher in the league, had held out, the situation could have been completely different. 메이저사이트
Inevitably, Kiwoom had a big power gap between the upper and lower hitters. However, the structure that put batters with good offensive productivity in the front kept opposing teams on edge, including Ronnie Dawson, a foreign hitter. Dawson did his bit with a batting average of 0.330, 11 homers, 57 RBIs, and OPS (on-base plus slugging) of 0.907 in 95 games this season. However, on July 31, he injured his knee while he was playing defense against a teammate and ended the season intactly.
Kiwoom chose to end the season rather than find Dawson’s replacement, and it was inevitable that the batting line, which was missing a foreign player, would weaken further. It is positive that several young players entered the position and gained experience, but it was not enough to lead to a performance. Kiwoom had a winning rate of 0.424 until July 31 when Dawson was absent, and after August 1, it had a winning rate of 0.356.
Paradoxically, the names of the two players make us wonder when Kiwoom will declare “WinNow” again. Ahn Woo-jin will not be allowed to join the team again next year. On top of that, Kim Hye-sung, the team’s main batter, is likely to advance to the Major League after this season. It is hard to say for sure that his team’s performance in 2025 will be better than this year’s. Perhaps because of this, Kiwoom has been accelerating its rebuilding process by securing big-time rookies with the right to designate.
It remains to be seen how much time this work is expected to take and how much time it will actually take. However, in the end, when Ahn Woo-jin returns to normal, it is possible to predict a picture of faithfully drawing the sketch and then running for the performance again by reinforcing the power in the areas necessary for the foundation of the players who have grown up so far. In conclusion, it could be a team operation that focuses more on 2026 than 2025.
Some in the league also predict that some of the posting money received in exchange for the transfer of Lee Jung-hoo and Kim Hye-sung may be invested in strengthening their power. Obviously, Kiwoom is a strong player who has been consistently performing in the league for a long time, and it is not a team that will be satisfied with this position until when. Of course, it was well revealed in 2023 that everything did not always go as planned, and attention is being paid to whether Kiwoom will be able to return to the Winnow front with its checkout counter.
