‘Was the 11-game winning streak a mirage’ Doosan is 5-13 since the record… Fall baseball crisis
The Doosan Bears of the Korean Baseball Organization (KBO) are in a bad way.
Doosan lost a 0-1 home game against KT in the 2023 KBO League at Jamsil Stadium in Seoul on Friday. The loss was their third straight and kept them in a precarious fifth place.
In an effort to end the losing streak, Doosan sent out foreign ace Raul Alcantara, who pitched seven innings of four-hit ball with six strikeouts and no walks, but the offense was unable to capitalize as they were held in check by opposing ace William Cuevas.
Doosan put runners in scoring position two batters later in the eighth inning when KT’s Choi Byeong-dae singled, but a throwing error by right fielder Kim In-tae allowed Kim Min-hyuk to hit a three-run homer for the game’s final run.
Sixth-ranked KIA was also caught by last-place Kiwoom, keeping the gap at 1.5 games, but their recent form has been so poor that they’re not sure they’ll make it to fall baseball. 먹튀검증
Doosan has been on a roller coaster ride since the summer. Starting with a win against the Ulsan Lotte on July 1, Doosan won 11 straight games, the most in franchise history, before losing to the Jamsil Lotte on July 25.
However, the winning streak was interrupted by a loss to Lotte on July 26, followed by a sweep by Jamsil rival LG, which resulted in a five-game losing streak.
Doosan, which recorded back-to-back losing series against Hanwha and KT in August, drew 1-1 with Samsung in Jamsil before being swept again by Hanwha in a three-game series in Daejeon. Doosan won the first game against Hanwha, but lost the next two, and the loss against KT was its third straight.
After an 11-game winning streak, the team’s 18-game record has been somewhat up and down, with a 5-18 record. The team has forgotten its hard-earned win-loss margin and is now in danger of losing its 5 percent winning percentage.
The team’s ranking, which was as high as third during their 11-game winning streak, has dropped to fifth, with sixth-place KIA and seventh-place Lotte closing in on them.
Faced with the crisis, manager Lee Seung-yeop made a gamble by switching the roles of struggling starter Choi Won-jun and reliever Hong Gun-hee to the middle innings, and decided to use left-hander Choi Seung-yong as the starter and right-hander Jung Chul-won as the closer, but the result was a blowout loss against KT.
Moreover, Doosan’s crisis is expected to continue as starter An Bang-manim Yang-ji is currently sidelined with a left side injury.