Lee Eui-ri (21) was suddenly excluded from the entry a day before the national team’s call-up due to blisters. Contrary to the KIA club’s opinion that he developed calluses after recovering blisters, Ryu Joong-il, the national team coach, expressed his view that Lee Eui-ri will not be able to play the role of a starting pitcher with blisters.
Before the national team’s first training session at Gocheok Sky Dome in Seoul on the 23rd, Hangzhou national baseball team manager Ryu Joong-il met with reporters and revealed why he replaced left-hander Lee Eui-ri with outfielder Yoon Dong-hee.
Lee Eui-ri suddenly failed to go to Hangzhou on the 22nd, a day before the national team’s call-up, citing his recovery from a finger injury. The Korea Baseball Softball Association’s Performance Improvement Committee and the KBO Power Enhancement Committee explained the reason for the replacement of the objection, saying, “I am recovering from a finger injury but it is difficult to show the best performance during the tournament.”
Lee Eui-ri suffered from injury after winning his 10th win of the season against Kiwoom in Gwangju on Aug. 16. He took 10 days off after being substituted in four innings after injuring his shoulder against KT in Suwon on August 22, and had an 11-day recovery period due to blisters on his left middle finger during the match against LG in Gwangju on the 9th. Lee Eui-ri returned from the match against Hanwha in Daejeon on the 21st without any abnormalities through a detailed examination, but he was sluggish with two hits and three outs and five runs (four earned runs) in the first ⅓ inning. He made the worst pitch in front of coach Ryu Joong-il and Cho Gye-hyun, chairman of the power reinforcement committee.
According to the KIA club, Lee Eui-ri is in good health with both shoulders and fingers. Fingers, which caused a blister controversy, are also known to have calluses again and do not interfere with pitching. KIA, which is in the midst of a ranking fight, carefully checked Lee Eui-ri’s physical condition and put him on the mound of the first division.
Then, why did Lee Eui-ri fail to play for the national team. Coach Ryu said, “I feel sorry that Lee Eui-ri has been replaced for the last time,” adding, “I saw Lee Eui-ri be plastered with a finger blister 15 days ago, and the responsible trainer kept checking. Later, I went to see Lee Eui-ri start in Daejeon on the 21st. “The way you see it may be a little different, but I saw the blister before throwing, and the blister after throwing less than two innings that day,” he explained.
The head of the national team judged that Lee Eui-ri, the end of Janggo, would have difficulty in starting pitcher duties in the aftermath of blisters. Manager Ryu said, “Lee Eui-ri is the best left-hander in Korea. He is the main player who should be in charge of the match against Taiwan and Japan, he said. “But it was like that in my eyes. It was questionable whether he could play more than 7 to 80 as a starter in this blister condition. “I thought a lot about it, but I decided to replace it because I judged that the starting pitcher could not throw more than 80,” he said.스포츠토토
Koo Chang-mo and Lee Eui-ri were also excluded from the entry, and manager Ryu was in a position to make the starting lineup only as a right-handed pitcher. But there is no concern. Coach Ryu said, “Koo Chang-mo and Lee Eui-ri are both the best left-handers in Korea, so they have difficulties, but we have Kwak Bin and Park Se-woong. The KBO League has more left-handed hitters than right-handed ones. “I believe the two players will do well because they also faced left-handed hitters well,” he said.
We could also hear the reason why he chose outfielder Yoon Dong-hee instead of pitcher Lee Eui-ri as a substitute. “There were 12 pitchers,” Ryu said. There was a replacement candidate, and I thought a lot about it,” he said. “There were only three outfielders, so I was deeply concerned about who to use when one person was injured. I was going to write Kim Hye-sung, Kang Baek-ho, and Kim Ji-chan, but Yoon Dong-hee did the best at the end. That’s why I decided to pick an outfielder,” he explained.
Ryu, who led the gold medal at the 2014 Incheon Asian Games, will also run for the gold medal in this event. Coach Ryu said, “I will focus all my efforts on the preliminary match against Taiwan to win the group.” I will definitely win a gold medal in Hangzhou and repay the people’s support,” he promised.
The national team will conduct training on the 23rd and 24th, and then check its sense of practice with Sangmu on the 26th. After the final training on the 27th, he will leave for Hangzhou, China, the land of the showdown, on the 28th. Both training and practice games are held at Gocheok Sky Dome.