Tomoya Satozaki (47), a former member of the Japanese national team, was astonished by the Korean national team’s crushing defeat.
Korea lost 4-13 to Japan in the 2023 World Baseball Classic (WBC) 1st round Group B 2nd game held at Tokyo Dome, Japan on the 10th.
In particular, the sluggishness of the mound was painful. Starting with starter Kwang-Hyun Kim, 4 runs in 2 innings (4 earned runs), Tae-in Won (1 run in 2 innings) – Bin Gwak (1 run in ⅔ innings) – Cheol-Won Jung (1 run in ⅓ innings) – Yoon-Sik Kim (3 runs) – Won-Joong Kim (1 run in ⅓ innings) ) – Jung Woo-young (⅔ innings) – Koo Chang-mo (⅓ innings, 2 runs) – Park Se-woong (1⅓ innings) – a total of 10 pitchers came out, but they repeatedly struggled and conceded runs.
With 8 runs against Australia and 13 runs against Japan, the team’s ERA rose to 11.12.
After the Korea-Japan match, Satozaki appeared on TV Asahi and analyzed Korea. He won the 2006 WBC tournament as a national team player.
The moderator asked Satozaki, “I didn’t expect such a big difference. Is Japan really strong?” Then he pointed out, “Japan is strong, but the KBO league is becoming a mainstay for foreign pitchers. In Korea, it seems that they are not trying to raise Korean pitchers.”
As he said, the proportion of foreign players in the KBO league is large. Especially the mound. Ten teams have foreign players in the one-two punch. Among the top 10 ERA in the KBO League last season, there were only three Korean pitchers: Woo-Jin Ahn (Kiwoom), Gwang-Hyun Kim (SSG), and Joon So-Jun (KT) ranked 10th.
The problem of the other line was also pointed out. Satozaki pointed out the aging of the batting line, saying, “The 1st to 3rd players are young players, while the 4th players are around the age of 35. The generation change is not going well.” 바카라
Just look at the center line. Park Byung-ho, Kim Hyun-soo, and Yang Eui-ji were all in their mid-thirties.
Amidst various problems, Korea was in danger of being eliminated in the first round with 2 losses in 2 matches in the group stage. Since 2013, WBC has been eliminated in the first round for three consecutive times.