Lotte right-hander Park Se-woong, 28, has successfully completed his final practice check in the regular season before joining the team for the 2023 Hangzhou Asian Games.
Park started against Samsung on April 17 at Samsung Lions Park in Daegu, South Korea, and pitched six innings of five-hit ball with one home run, one walk, four strikeouts, and two earned runs in the team’s 7-4 win.
Individually, Park continued his three-game winning streak. It was his second consecutive quality start after allowing two runs in 6.2 innings against NC on April 9.토토사이트
The regular season is winding down, but Park’s form is only getting better. Expectations are high for his role as a wild card in the Asian Games.
Park, who signed Lotte’s first multi-year contract at the end of last season for five years and 9 billion won, has gone “all in” this season. Park, who had applied for and passed a tryout for the position of vice president, decided to give up the job and put everything on the line this year during the Asian Games.
Park has a strong affinity for the Taeguk mark. He was selected for the national team at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, where he played for the first time under the Taeguk mark, and came back a more mature player. His international experience changed the way he looked at baseball, and he actually became more mentally mature and continued to excel in the domestic league, finishing the season with 10 wins (11 losses), his third career double-digit win total.
From there, he took on the challenge of international competition. He was named to the World Baseball Classic (WBC) roster before the season started and was in the best shape of the pitching staff. “I’ll pitch any position,” he said, and was one of the only bright spots in a team that struggled to get out of the first round due to poor pitching. Park’s stellar performance in Game 2, with six shutout innings, confirmed his international credentials. “All the pitchers did their best to prepare,” he said of his teammates, and once again used the WBC experience as a learning experience.
In the aftermath of the WBC, Park had a slow start to the 2023 season, going 1-0 with a 5.12 ERA in four games in April, but he bounced back in May with three wins and a 1.88 ERA in five games. He continued to be the “Glasses Ace” and was named to the final roster for the Asian Games in June. He had a brief lull in July with three losses in three games, but as the tournament approached, he found his form again. In September, he went 2-0 with a 3.18 ERA in three games.
Unlike the Tokyo Olympics and WBC, the Asian Games is a big deal for Park. The Asian Games have an age limit on the roster, and Park, who was born in 1995, is the oldest player on the roster as a wild card.
This puts a lot of pressure on his shoulders given the lack of experienced starters on the national team. Furthermore, with Lee Jung-hoo out with an injury, the batting lineup has been weakened and the role of the pitcher has become even more important. Despite these pressures, Park is determined to give it his all.