“We’re not a team that’s easy to build” Resurrected transfer believes in heroics

Kiwoom Heroes infielder Lee Won-seok is starting to smile again.

Lee Won-seok went 1-for-3 with a walk and an RBI, including a wedge hit in the eighth inning, to lead his team to a 9-6 comeback victory over the Hanwha Eagles in the 2023 Shinhan Bank SOL KBO League at Daejeon Hanwha Life Eagles Park on Sunday. Kiwoom remained in seventh place with no games in hand on eighth-place KT.메이저놀이터

In the game, Lee Won-seok hit an RBI single off Yoon Dae-kyung with runners on first and third in the top of the seventh inning, trailing 4-3, to make it 5-3. Kiwoom scored three runs in the bottom of the seventh to make it 5-6, but in the top of the eighth, Lee Jung-hoo and Lee Hyung-jong hit back-to-back pushing balls to make it 7-6.

With the bases loaded, Lee Won-seok pulled a high fastball from reliever Park Sang-won for a two-run double to seal the 9-6 victory. It was Lee’s first multi-hit game since joining Kiwoom via trade on April 27. “I’ve been really bad,” Lee said with a bitter smile after the game.

Prior to the trade, Lee had appeared in 19 games this season and was batting .362, good for fourth in the league. In need of an offensive right-handed hitter, Kiwoom traded reliever Kim Tae-hoon to acquire Lee Won-seok, but he went into a serious slump in May with a 0.158 monthly average. It was an embarrassing performance for both Ki and Lee, but he has since rebounded with a .317 average in 13 games this month. He had four hits in 25 games in May, including a three-hit day.

Lee said, “Since last month, I’ve been apologizing for not performing as well as the team expected. Baseball was going well and then suddenly it wasn’t. My head was full of complications and stress, but I tried to keep it as simple as possible, and I’ve been getting hits lately. Hopefully today will be a good start,” he said after the win.

Regarding his two-out RBI single in the eighth inning, he said, “In my previous at-bat (in the fifth inning), I struck out with the bases loaded. I wanted to make up for it because I wasn’t doing well in scoring position, but I was lucky to get a hit because a throwing error came in.”

Lee Won-seok is a senior who has been through a lot, but he doesn’t show his hardships in front of his juniors and laughs with them. “It was hard because I didn’t get good grades, but I thought, ‘Let’s go out to the baseball field and have fun,'” Lee said. It’s less than the days I’ve been playing. If I keep feeling upset, I’ll regret it later, so I tried to have fun.”

Kiwoom recently jumped to seventh place after falling to ninth. They are four games behind fifth-place Doosan and 1.5 games behind sixth-place KIA. Lee Won-seok said, “The pitchers are throwing hard and well, and (Lee) Jung-hoo has come back to life since last month. I believe that if the batters who have been bad come back to life, they will rise in a few games. I don’t think Kiwoom is a team that will fall apart easily.”

Finally, Lee Won-seok said, “I apologize to the fans for not performing well for over a month. The team and fans have been expecting something from me since I joined the team. There are still a lot of games left, so I will try harder to fulfill their expectations.”

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)