The battle for second place and fourth and fifth place in the KBO is back in the balance.
After a scary run to third place, the KT Wiz have now closed to within one game of the stumbling second-place SSG Landers.
KT won the visiting Doosan Bears 5-2 in the 2023 Shinhan Bank SOL KBO League on Saturday at Jamsil Stadium in Seoul.
KT extended its winning streak to four games, while Doosan lost its fourth straight game and now finds itself in an unsettled fifth place.
KT starter Uhm Sang-baek mixed his fastball, which topped out at 149 kilometers per hour, with his changeup and cut fastball, tossing six innings of one-hit ball with three walks and seven strikeouts to earn his seventh win of the season. Uhm has won his last four starts, all complete games.
KT broke open a 0-0 game in the top of the second inning with a double to left field by Lee Ho-yeon, a walk to Doosan starter Kim Dong-joo and a stolen base by Oh Yoon-seok to put runners on second and third.
Kim Sang-soo worked a full count (three balls and two strikes) and took a Kim Dong-joo fastball for a two-run double to right field.
Two batters later, Bae Joo-dae crushed a 145-kilometer per hour fastball from Kim Dong-joo over the left field wall to make it 4-0. It was Choi’s first home run of the season.
KT had runners on first and third in the bottom of the fourth inning, but first baseman Oh Yoon-seok made a great catch on Doosan’s Kim In-tae’s hard line drive and threw out Jose Rojas at first base to end the inning.
In the bottom of the seventh inning, the middle infielders showed great cohesion in the field, as the infielders sprinted more than 10 meters to catch a ball that flew over their heads to prevent a run from scoring.
Doosan cut the deficit to 4-1 with a solo home run by pinch-hitter Kim Jae-ho in the bottom of the eighth, but gave up another run in the top of the ninth on a wild pitch by pitcher Kim Min-kyu.
SSG lost 4-7 to the Lotte Giants in Busan.
SSG, which is seven games behind the first-place LG Twins, found itself in a sandwich situation, trailing KT by one game.
Riding a three-game winning streak, seventh-place Lotte kept its “fall baseball” hopes alive by staying within 0.5 games of sixth-place KIA and closing the gap to one game over fifth-place Doosan.
Four teams, from the fourth-place NC Dinos to the seventh-place Lotte, are within 2.5 games of each other.
Trailing 1-2 in the bottom of the fifth inning, Lotte broke the game open with a three-run home run to left field by No. 4 hitter Jeon Jun-woo.
SSG tied the game at 4-4 in the top of the sixth on an infield single by Kim Sung-hyun after Kang Jin-sung’s right-center homer and Choi Ji-hoon’s double.
LOTTE regained the lead with a pinch-hitter’s RBI double to right-center field, and scored two more runs in the seventh with a solo home run to right field by freshman Kim Min-seok and a double to left-center field by transfer student Geoffo Lee Jung-hoon to take a 7-4 lead.
Lotte closer Kim Won-joong, who pitched a scoreless ninth inning, became the 21st player in history to earn his 100th career save.
The NC also fell to the Hanwha Eagles, 3-4, at Changwon Anbang for their third straight loss.
Hanwha opened the scoring in the first inning as Moon Hyun-bin doubled to left-center, Nick Williams singled to right and Noh Si-hwan scored on a sacrifice fly.
Jang Jin-hyuk led off the sixth inning with a walk, stole second base and came home on Lee Jin-young’s RBI single to left, and then hit a leadoff triple to make it 3-1 in the eighth.
Hanwha drove in a run in the top of the ninth on Williams’ RBI single to right.
The NC bats, held to just four hits, scored two runs in the bottom of the ninth on a bases-loaded double to left-center by Park Gun-woo and two infield grounders.
Hanwha starter Lee Tae-yang earned the win with five innings of one-run ball.
At Kia Champions Field in Gwangju, KIA pounded out 14 hits to defeat the Kiwoom Heroes 11-3.
Kia starter Lee Yi-ri pitched six innings, striking out nine and allowing one run on five hits to reach the 10-win plateau for the second straight year.
After scoring the game-winning run in the top of the first on Choi Hyung-woo’s sacrifice fly, KIA added three runs in the second on Kim Tae-gun’s RBI double and Park Chan-ho’s RBI single.
After scoring one run in the third and fourth innings, they added three runs in the fifth thanks to a Kiwoom error.
Second baseman Park Chan-ho went 4-for-4 with three RBIs, while Lee Chang-jin went 4-for-3 with two RBIs and Kim Tae-gun went 3-for-3.
Self-destructive with three errors, Kiwoom pulled within two runs in the top of the ninth on a Kim Xiang single to center, but it was not enough to win the game.
While the rest of the field was mired in confusion, top-ranked LG accelerated its path to the Korean Series with a 6-3 win over the Samsung Lions in Daegu.
With 44 games remaining in the regular season and 100 games played, LG has won 62 games, tied two and lost 36, making it the only team with a winning percentage in the six figures.
After Samsung scored a run in the top of the first inning on a leadoff double by Kim Hyun-jun, an infield single by Kim Sung-yoon and two groundouts, LG tied the game at 1-1 in the top of the second on two hits, a passed ball and an infield groundout by Park Dong-won.
Samsung regained the lead in the fifth inning after starter David Buchanan was forced to leave after just two innings due to a sore neck, thanks to a leadoff double by Kim Dong-jin and a sacrifice fly by Kim Sung-yoon to make it 2-1.
The game came down to a single run in the top of the sixth inning by Park Dong-won.
With the bases loaded on two singles and a walk, Park launched a 120-meter grand slam over the left field fence off Samsung’s fourth pitcher, Kim Dae-woo.
In the eighth inning, Kim Hyun-soo hit a solo home run to right field to make it 6-2 in favor of LG.
Samsung pulled within one run in the bottom of the eighth on Kim Sung-yoon’s solo home run, 카지노사이트넷 but couldn’t muster any more momentum.