He’s backtracked on what he said publicly. After giving Lee Sang-young a chance for a month, he demoted him to the second team after just two appearances.
LG Twins manager Yoon Kyung-yeop dropped Lee Sang-young from the first team roster and called up Lee Ji-gang for the away 꽁머니 game against the NC Dinos at Changwon NC Park on April 21.
It’s a surprising decision. Yeom, who had pitched well during an eight-game winning streak for the Commerce, said he would give Lee Sang-young a chance for a month after his discharge from the military to take over the fourth starting spot, but after only two appearances, he made a decision that didn’t match his public statements.
You can’t take back what you’ve already spit out. If you can’t keep your word, you can’t trust your manager. Of course, he could have stood by his word and continued to give him a chance to start. However, Yeom chose not to stand by his words. He chose not to stand by his words because he was thinking about the team and the players rather than his own reputation.
Lee Sang-young has shown a lot of growth in his career, especially this season, when he won all eight games he pitched. He took the loss in his last start before being discharged from the military, but returned to LG with an 8-1 record and a 2.63 ERA.
Yeom decided to give him the starting spot because he was competitive with his sidearm change. Aside from Im Chan-kyu, there were no other Korean starters with good pitching, so he wanted Lee Sang-young to take over the No. 4 spot, and he decided to give him a chance for about a month. The reason Yoon spoke out publicly was so that Lee could take his time with his pitching and not feel pressured.
In his comeback game, Lee pitched four innings against Jamsil Samsung Electronics on the 14th, giving up four hits, one walk, two strikeouts, and two runs. However, in his second start on the 20th against the Changwon NC, he was disastrous. In the first inning, he gave up two runs on four walks, and in the second inning, he was hit by a pitch, and the players’ concentration seemed to drop as they made errors on defense. Yeom made a quick pitching change to break the flow. Lee Sang-young was pulled after giving up three runs (two earned) on two hits and four walks with one strikeout in 1⅓ innings.
It looked like he would make his next start despite his poor performance in the NC, as Yeom had promised to give him a chance for a month, but the next day, Yeom removed him from the first team.
“I didn’t think there was any point in waiting for a month. I decided that giving him a chance now would not help him or the team,” Yeom said, revealing the reason for his exclusion. As he showed in the NC, he had no control of his pitches and his fastball was only 139 kilometers.
In fact, Yeom was shocked to see the scoreboard at Changwon NC Park. At Changwon NC Park, a strip display in the stands shows the pitcher’s velocity and pitch type, but it kept showing Lee as a changeup when he was throwing a fastball. “I wondered if it was a changeup because the fastball didn’t have enough rotation,” Yeom said, indicating that Lee’s current condition was not good, meaning there was no guarantee that he would get better in future starts.
Eventually reversing himself, Yeom quickly decided to start Lee for the home game against the Lotte Giants in Jamsil on the 25th. He decided to move Lee 메이저토토 Jung-yong, who had been the closer, into the starting role. “We had a coaching staff meeting after yesterday’s (20th) game and decided to use Lee Jung-yong as a starter, and today I had a meeting with him to finalize it,” said Yeom. “I told him that he was not doing well in the bullpen this season and needed to change the atmosphere, and that he would be pitching for the Commerce next year, so I thought it was okay to turn him into a starter in advance. He agreed.”