SEOUL– As a microcosm of how poorly their season in the Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) has gone so far, the NC Dinos lost to the Doosan Bears 8-4 on Tuesday with their best pitcher on the mound.
The Dinos came into the game at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in Seoul fresh off a 2-1, extra-inning victory over the KT Wiz on Sunday. Prior to Tuesday’s contest, NC manager Lee Dong-wook said it was an encouraging victory that snapped a three-game losing skid and added he hoped his last-place club, with a 6-14 record, would be able to build on that.
The Dinos had won back-to-back games just once all season. But they failed to do it for the second time Tuesday, with starter Drew Rucinski submitting his worst outing of 2022.
Rucinski came into this game with the league-leading 0.33 ERA, having allowed just one run in 27 innings. On Tuesday, he surrendered five runs, through only three of them were earned, in five innings, while allowing a season-worst eight hits. That ERA was never going to be sustainable, but Rucinski’s first subpar outing came at an inopportune time for the Dinos, which dropped to 6-15.
Doosan’s No. 9 hitter Park Sei-hyok knocked in the game’s first run with a double — his first extra-base hit of the season in 48 at-bats — in the second inning. Leadoff man Kim In-tae then drove Park home with a bloop single to left.
Left fielder Nick Martini bobbled the ball off a high bounce, allowing Park to score from second without a play. Martini would have had a play at home if he’d fielded the ball cleanly, since Park, even with a head start from second at two outs, isn’t exactly a fast runner.
The Dinos got a run back off starter Robert Stock in the third, but the Bears jumped on Rucinski for three runs to open up a 5-1 lead.
The defense failed Rucinski in that chaotic inning. With a runner at first, shortstop No Jin-hyuk failed to grab a towering fly ball hit by An Jae-seok. As the ball landed in no-man’s land, Martini grabbed it and alertly threw to second to get the lead runner. The throw, though, bounced in front of second baseman Seo Ho-cheol, and everyone was safe.
Kang Seung-ho then put down the sacrifice bunt right back to the mound. Rucinski fielded the ball but made an errant throw to third, allowing a run to score.
Two batters later, Kim In-tae knocked in two more runs with a single through the drawn-in infield.
With Rucinski out of the game, the Bears jumped on reliever Ha Jun-young for three runs in the sixth to build an 8-1 lead. Jose Miguel Fernandez’s two-run double and Kim Jae-hwan’s RBI single did the trick.
The Dinos grounded into two double plays, including one by No Jin-hyuk with two men on and one out in the top sixth.
No, the Dinos’ captain, atoned for his two fielding errors and the double play with a two-run single as part of a three-run eighth for the Dinos, but they couldn’t get any closer.
Kim In-tae went 3-for-5 with three RBIs from the top of the Bears’ order.
Source: Yonhap News Agency