“I don’t worry if there’s Roh Si-hwan.”
This was what Ryu Joong-il, the head coach of the national baseball team, told reporters earlier this month while leading a training session for the Premier 12 at Gocheok Sky Dome in Seoul. He regretted Noh’s absence, saying there was no right batter for No. 4. Noh Si-hwan failed to make the national team in the end due to a slight slowdown in the Hanwha Eagles this season.
In fact, there are more players in the Korean national team who failed due to injury. Moon Dong-ju (Hanwha), the ace pitcher of last year’s Hangzhou Asian Games and Asian Pro Baseball Championship, was sidelined due to injury. Won Tae-in (Samsung Lions), who showed the best performance among Korean pitchers in the KBO League this year, also suffered an injury during the Korean Series.
Manager Ryu Joong-il tried to take Koo Ja-wook (Samsung) as the focal point along with Noh Si-hwan in the batting lineup. However, Koo was injured while running base in the playoff against the LG Twins, and failed to make it to the national team in the end. What happened was that Kim Young-woong got off the train after getting stuck in a wall while riding a bus to join Seoul from Daegu.
Turning the clock a bit more, the fact that Lee Eui-ri of the Kia Tigers underwent Tommy John surgery in June was painful for the Korean national team. Kim Hye-sung of the Kiwoom Heroes and Kang Baek-ho of the KT Wiz are absent from the basic military training. This is not a big deal when considering only big players. If all of them had been to Taipei, the Korean national team might have gone all the way to Tokyo Dome.
Is there a team that doesn’t have a story? Japan, Taiwan, Venezuela and the U.S. that are going to the Tokyo Dome must have some players who couldn’t afford to play due to injury. The lack of power to replace players who couldn’t play due to injury itself shows the precarious reality of Korean baseball.
As a result, the absence of the fourth hitter and native ace has become more pronounced. However, this is a long-standing concern for the Korean baseball. This role is largely played by foreign players in the 10 KBO League teams, so it is not obvious, but it is repeated in international competitions.
The problem is that there is no right way to solve the problem. The 10 teams diligently call for nurturing and rebuilding. The actual results are also clear. Recently, many young players have appeared in the KBO League. However, through this competition, I realized that I have to discover more talented people than I am satisfied with it yet.
Korea’s No. 2 position in Asia is now at stake. Starting with the preliminary loss to Taiwan at the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Asian Games, the 2019 Premier 12 Super Round loss, the 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games preliminary loss, and the first game loss of this year’s event. Meanwhile, the only victories are the finals of the Hangzhou Asian Games and the 2023 Asian Baseball Championship preliminary. The team has won two games and lost four games in the past six games. 온라인바카라
In the early 2000s, the team significantly narrowed the gap with Japan, but the gap widened again. Rather, the team is losing ground to Taiwan. For this reason, the team cannot be proud of itself as No. 2 in Asia. Australia, which has been incorporated into Asia, is not an easy target. It lost 7-8 in its first World Baseball Classic match last year. Australia or top-ranked European countries that won through cold games in the past have no guarantee that Korea will win.
The 10 teams in the KBO League are professionals. Performance is important, but the obligation to foster promising players is not significant. Given the peculiarity of the Korean baseball league, the team is only in charge of developing the team. Basically, the role of amateur and student baseball, and the Korea Baseball Softball Association is important. The KBO is in charge of running the national team, but we need to look back on where amateur and student baseball is headed. No matter how well the KBO manages the national team, there is no way if amateur baseball is not good enough. Of course, there is no way to prevent the advent of the era of population cliff in a big way.
