Every team has a “starter. But baseball isn’t just about the starters. Furthermore, everyone ages. The next step is to develop them. This is also not easy. It’s not just a matter of gaining experience.
Modern baseball emphasizes ‘prospects’ more than ever before. The KBO League is no different. Every team pampers their ‘young players’. That’s why they put so much effort into the draft.
However, ‘developing’ them is another story. It’s not about feeding them experience simply because they’re young. You calculate that they will be good and give them a chance. You can’t give them that indefinitely. At the end of the day, players have to do well to get a chance and a spot.메이저사이트
Hanwha coach Choi Won-ho said, “In fact, it’s hard to give lower-ranked teams a chance. You can’t push certain players. In the end, if they do well, they’ll go out. That’s all there is to it. How do you use a hitter who keeps going 0-for-4, and how do you use a pitcher who keeps blowing up?” he said.
“If you take LG as an example, having Lee Jae-won in the bottom of the order doesn’t make a big difference. They don’t have a problem because their batting lineup is so good. We are different. It’s unavoidable. We don’t raise them. They grow up. When they’re good, we use them. When they go down, they take it away.”
In general, the teams at the bottom of the table are usually weaker than the teams at the top. They often lose their starters. The backups are even worse. In this situation, you can’t give young players a chance to “dry out”. You have to use good players. It’s part of being a professional.
Choi Won-ho also talked about Moon Dong-ju. “He was not very good in May (8.22 ERA). But he showed something in April (2.38 ERA). So we were able to wait. It wouldn’t have been possible if we had been bad from the start. In the end, you have to earn your spot,” he emphasized.
It’s not much different for the top teams. SSG has quite a few problems in the bullpen. Noh Kyung-eun and Go Hyo-joon are veterans. They need another resource. It’s not like they don’t have pitchers, but there’s no other resource that jumps out at you. Rookie Lee Roon is the next best option.
“He needs to get a lot of experience in the first team, even if it’s just for next year,” said Kim Won-hyung. “Not just anyone can give him experience. He has qualities. I see potential. The coaching staff should be patient and use him.”
He also said, “We don’t have any pitchers who can pitch in tough situations except for Lee now. He needs to improve more. The same goes for the other pitchers.”
In fact, the bullpen is no slouch either. It’s dominated by veterans. Young blood is needed. At first base, Jeon Eui-san, who hit so well last year, was expected to be the starter this season.
But that didn’t happen. He’s batting in the low 20s and has less than five home runs. That’s how hard it is to become a starter. It takes years.
There is a phrase that 10 club managers say the same. “There are no players,” they say. It is difficult to develop players. Both the first team and the Futures have fixed rosters. It’s hard to pick and choose from hundreds of players. You have to produce the best results with limited resources.
So you have to develop them well. It’s not normal. The players have to suffer, and the coaching staff has to be patient. Every team is difficult to develop for its own reasons.