What are the weaknesses of the Korean baseball team from the perspective of Japan? A Japanese data analysis company cited Lee Kang-cheol’s weakness as being against left-handed pitchers with fastballs.
Japan’s ‘Data Stadium’ published an analysis article on the World Baseball Classic (WBC) winning candidate through its local media ‘Sports Navi’ on the 6th. The media picked Korea as the ‘second round’ of Group B in the preliminaries along with Japan, but said that it had certain weaknesses.
The media argued that the Japanese national team should actively employ a left-handed pitcher with a fastball in the match against Korea. The media said, “There are not many left-handed pitchers who throw fast balls that exceed 150 km in the KBO league. There are few left-handed pitchers with fastballs in the WBC national team this time,” and analyzed foreign players who played in both Korea and Japan to guess the capabilities of batters in the KBO league.
The player presented as the first reason was Mel Rojas Jr. Lohas, who entered the KBO League in 2017 and played an active role in the KT Wiz with a batting average of 0.321 and 132 homers until 2020, moved to Japan in 2021 and played 149 games with a batting average of 0.220 and 17 homers in two seasons.
The media said, “Mel Rojas Jr., who was the league MVP in 2020, had a batting average of 0.379 against lefties in Korea that year, but struggled with a batting average of 0.148 in Japan in 2021.”
‘Data Stadium’ also mentioned Andrew Suarez, a foreign left-handed pitcher who played for the LG Twins in 2021. The media pointed out the weakness of the KBO League, saying, “Suarez played an active role in Korea with an average ERA of 10-2 and 2.18, but in Japan he was kicked out after a year.”
As another basis, the media also talked about the characteristics of the Korean national team, which struggled against Japan at the time of the 2019 Premier12. The media analyzed, “At the time, the Korean batting average was 0.260 against the Japanese right-handed pitcher, but only 0.183 against the left-handed pitcher.” 온라인카지노
I also heard the example of Lee Jung-hoo, whom the Japanese national team selected as ‘the number 1 on the alert’. The media emphasized that Korean baseball has a weakness for left-handed pitchers with fastballs, saying, “Lee Jung-hoo, who has been batting 30% against lefties in the KBO league for the past five seasons, only had no hits in 12 at-bats at the Tokyo Olympics held in 2021.”
The media said, “There are left-handed pitchers in the Japanese national team, such as Shota Imana (Yokohama DeNA Baystars), Yuki Matsui (Rakuten Golden Eagles), and Keiji Takahashi (Yakult), who can run at over 150 km/h.” “The starter is Yu Darvish (San Diego Padres). is likely, but the left-handed pitcher operation will be the winning point in the Korean War.”
Meanwhile, Japan was placed in Group B with Korea, Australia, Czech Republic and China in the first round of the tournament held in their home country. Japan won two consecutive championships in 2006 and 2009, the first WBC tournaments, but failed to maintain a relationship with the championship, finishing in third place in both the 3rd and 4th tournaments.