Tigers manager marvels at All-Star slugger: ‘He knows how to hit home runs’

GWANGJU — Kia Tigers manager Lee Bum-ho allowed himself to be a fan for a moment Saturday, when his MVP-winning slugger Kim Do-yeong hammered two home runs in the team’s opening victory over the LG Twins in their Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) postseason series.

Kim drove in four runs as the Tigers prevailed 5-1 in Game 1 of the best-of-five series at Gwangju-Kia Champions Field in the southwestern city of Gwangju. Kim’s solo shot broke a 1-1 tie in the bottom of the fourth inning, and his two-run bomb extended the Tigers’ lead to 5-1 in the bottom eighth. In between, Kim delivered a sacrifice fly in the sixth inning.

“What else can I say? He is incredible,” Lee said of Kim, who led the KBO with 45 home runs in the regular season. “He knows how to hit home runs. I think this victory showed how Kim Do-yeong can singlehandedly change the complexion of a game. The first game in any postseason series is always important and I am quite satisfied with the way we performed today as a team.”

Twins manager Youm Kyoung-youb, who had said before the series that keeping Kim in check was the key for his team, conceded defeat.

“We had done our homework against him but our pitchers just failed to locate their pitches,” Youm said. “And Kim Do-yeong did not miss on those mistakes. And those were not easy pitches to hit homers off, and Do-yeong still went deep. He is a great player and I tip my cap to him.”

Youm rued a few missed opportunities to cash in on runners aboard, including in the sixth inning when they had two runners on with nobody out and the heart of the order coming up.

“Our big bats had a few at-bats with runners in scoring position and we just didn’t capitalize on them,” he said. “That is just how baseball goes sometimes. If you don’t score when you are supposed to, then you concede the momentum to the other team.”