His greed knows no bounds. ‘Grandson of the wind’ Lee Jung-hoo (25, Kiwoom Heroes) boldly tried his hand at batting form.스포츠토토
On the 15th (Korean time), Lee Jeong-hoo, who was summoned to the baseball team of the World Baseball Classic (WBC) in Tucson, Arizona, USA, showed a different batting form from last year and predicted a change. In an interview with this magazine, he said, “I narrowed my stride (stance) a little and lowered the height of my arms (holding the bat),” and laughed, saying, “It’s okay when I practice, but I don’t know because I haven’t played the game yet.”
Lee Jung-hoo is the best hitter in the KBO League in name and reality. He played in 142 regular season games last year, hitting 0.349 (193 hits in 553 at-bats), hitting 23 homers and 113 RBIs. He became the fourth player in history to achieve the “2 consecutive titles in batting title,” winning 5 KBO League batting crowns (batting average, most hits, RBIs, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage) and the first best player (MVP) in his debut. There is no fault in terms of batting enough to rank first in history (0.342) in batting average based on 3,000 at-bats.
Still, he modified his batting form this winter. Lee Jung-hoo said, “(Kim) Ha-seong has a big influence.” “Ha-sung told me that if he comes to the US anyway, I have to revise my batting form unconditionally. I wanted to shorten the term (period) rather than go and fail and change. If I go to the Major League (MLB) in a prepared state, wouldn’t it help me to adapt? I want to do better than last year.”
Kim Ha-seong (San Diego Padres), who returned to Korea after the end of last season, met Lee Jung-hoo and gave him batting advice. Kim Ha-sung and Lee Jung-hoo are close seniors and juniors who ate together at Heroes. Ha-seong Kim signed a contract with the MLB San Diego club in January 2021, and Jung-hoo Lee plans to knock on the big league door with a posting system (private competitive bidding) after this season. exchange various information with each other.
Lee Jeong-hoo’s modification of his batting form is a prescription to more effectively deal with fast balls. It is similar to Na Seong-beom (now KIA Tigers), who changed his batting form ahead of the 2019 season. At that time, Na Seong-beom lowered the position of his hands holding the bat from ear level to chest in preparation for entering the MLB. His goal was to reduce take-back (moving the bat back slightly before swinging). If the takeback is large, you can send power to the ball, but it is not easy to cope with the ball quickly because the swing trajectory is large.
In MLB, where there are many fastball pitchers, it can be a factor that can fail to adapt. Lee Jung-hoo said, “I don’t think I’ve ever thought about how to hit a fast ball in the KBO league. It’s the same in international competitions.” Ha Sung-hyung’s story came to me a lot. It was more helpful because someone who was there (MLB) told me about it.” “The numbers tell me. In Korea, I would see at most 20 balls over 155 km/h a year, but Ha Sung-hyung faced more than 270 such balls last year alone. It’s a huge figure,” he said. I felt something about that because I was watching a ball that I should have seen once or not, almost every day.” In MLB, there are not a few pitchers with a 160km/h fastball that cannot be seen in the KBO league.
Sudden changes can shake the overall performance of the season. Lee Jung-hoo said, “I’m anxious, but if it doesn’t work, I can come back.” Considering the time to adapt, I think now is the right time (to make a change).”
The WBC is a test bed to check the changes midway through. A large number of fastball pitchers representing each country participate in the competition. “I really want to do well,” said Lee Jung-hoo.