One more time, Samsung's remaining FA without any worries? A new weapon equipped at the age of imminent danger → A welcome rain of the bullpen who returned to Doctor K
Apr 24, 2025
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Veteran left-hander Baek Jung-hyun (39) is helping the Samsung Lions bullpen with a brilliant performance.
Baek Jung-hyun took the mound as the third pitcher in the seventh inning with a 6-2 lead over the defending champion KIA Tigers at Lions Park in Daegu on the 23rd, and laid a stepping stone to a 7-2 victory with one hit and no run in one inning.
He struck out all three out counts. Strong hitters such as Han Seung-taek, Park Chan-ho, and Kim Sun-bin had a hard time responding to Baek Jung-hyun's pitching.
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Han Seung-taek struck out swinging with a fork ball falling outside, and Park Chan-ho struck out rooking with a high-course fork ball outside. The batters were helpless because the ball was superbly set in the corner.
For seasoned Kim Sun-bin, who watched the forkball crystal ball from the stand-by at-bat, he showed a high fork ball and drew a half swing strikeout with a slider that fell low. Scene of overpowering a seasoned batter with greater skill.
Baek Jung-hyun's performance in the 2025 season is remarkable after returning as a bullpen pitcher for the first time in eight years since 2017. A 1.65 ERA with three runs in 12 games and 16 ⅓ innings. He is the extreme middleman with a hit rate of 0.125 and WHIP 0.61.
The ball is powerful enough to allow only three walks and catch 18 strikeouts per inning, more than one. Unlike last year, when he was trying to guess, it is impressive to see him overcome the crisis by turning it into a strikeout.
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Baek Jung-hyun, who had some difficulties in changing up his main weapon last year, intensively honed his new pitching forkball ahead of this season.
The new weapon forkball is showing its power. This is the result of nearly half of the strikeouts being caught with fork balls. Compared to the speed of up to 143km, the combination of four-seam with high pitch value and Shin Koo-jong folk ball on the slider made it difficult for batters to play rock-paper-scissors.
Despite his ceaseless efforts, Baek Jeong-hyun does not have any secular greed. I just take the mound at this moment and do my best.
As for the elimination of the selection, the junior players should have taken charge of it," he says calmly. Regarding the bullpen he's playing now, he says it's his role that he's going through for a while, saying, `Young juniors will take on it.'
The four-year FA contract of up to 3.8 billion won ahead of the 2021 season ends this year. With the current performance, Baek Jung-hyun is likely to stay longer at his favorite one-club Samsung.
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Many juniors already visit Baek Jung-hyun, starting with Choi Won-tae, a transfer student. Baek Jung-hyun is also the idol of rising left-hander rookie Bae Chan-seung. Bae Chan-seung, who has super-strong pitching, can become the league's best left-hander by absorbing Baek Jung-hyun's opposing strengths and supplementing his weaknesses.
This article was translated by Naver AI translator.
