Jung-hoo, sit down for a while. A terrible slump, Lee Jung-hoo, and eventually another SF selection exclusion + full-time break. I wish I had one missed hit

Jun 22, 2025

Did back pain recur again. Or is it because they are in a terrible hitting slump.

San Francisco Giants manager Bob Melvin eventually brought up a special measure. Lee Jung-hoo (27), who has been the team's leading hitter since the opening, has recently fallen into a severe hitting slump, has been excluded from the starting list. It is analyzed as an exclusion that means 'take a break if it doesn't fit'.

San Francisco played a 2025 Major League Baseball (MLB) interleague home game against the Boston Red Sox at Oracle Park in San Francisco, California on the morning of the 22nd (Korea Standard Time). However, Lee Jung-hoo was not seen in the match. He was also absent from the starting list and did not come out as a pinch-hitter or a log-off in the second half of the game. Without Lee Jung-hoo, San Francisco won 3-2.

Lee Jung-hoo has been excluded from the starting list before. Recently, it did not come out before the Atlanta Braves on the 9th. However, at the time, there was a clear reason for 'back pain'. It's a little different this time. There was no announcement that back pain was the reason for the exclusion. Therefore, it can be said that Melvin gave Lee Jung-hoo, who has recently been in a severe hitting slump, a break.

Recently, Lee Jung-hoo has been suffering the worst hitting slump to the point where he can never be in the starting lineup. The batting average has been falling steadily since early May.

Lee Jung-hoo, who had no hits in four at-bats before the Minnesota Twins on May 10, eventually had a monthly batting average of 0.231 (25 hits in 108 at-bats) in May. It was even more sluggish in June. He has a batting average of 0.172 (10 hits in 58 at-bats) in 17 games so far. He has not produced a hit in eight of his 17 games. In particular, he had no hits in three consecutive games from the Cleveland Guardians on the 19th to the Boston game on the 21st.

In the end, it can be said that Melvin, who has entrusted Lee Jung-hoo to escape the slump so far, directly intervened in Lee Jung-hoo's current slump. There are many reasons for Lee Jung-hoo's sudden slump in hitting. This is the result of a combination of back pain, microscopic analysis of the opponent and the burden of the full-time major league season.

Fortunately, among Lee Jung-hoo's various batting indicators, the strikeout rate and the average speed of in-field plays are still coming out well. Lee Jung-hoo's strikeout rate of 11.2 percent is the ninth lowest among 159 batters who passed the regulation. In addition, the average speed of 25 in-play hits in the last seven games is 88.4 miles, 0.5 miles higher than the season average of 87.9.

It means that he is still getting less strikeouts, and he is hitting well with strength. Nevertheless, no hits should be viewed as an area of bad luck. In this case, if only one or two long-distance or lucky hits come out, the escape from the slump can be made rapidly as if the blocked water broke. Attention is focusing on whether Lee Jung-hoo will be able to regain his sense of hitting.

This article was translated by Naver AI translator.