Major League teams vie for Park Byeong-ho

There are reasons U.S. Major League teams have competed to recruit Park Byeong-ho of the Nexen Heroes. They give high marks to his capacity to send his hits to right, left and center as he pleases. He is different from sluggers in the Major League, who mostly do pull hitting.

“Major League recruiters give high marks to Park Byeong-ho, because he is a ‘spray hitter,’ who can send his hits to diverse directions," said sports channel SPOTV baseball commentator Daniel Kim who is an expert in Major League baseball. "Since Park has especially strong capacity to hit push hitting, I expect he will have soft landing in the Major League.”

Park made many efforts in push hitting this season. He practiced a lot to intentionally send hits to the right. As a result, he has increased the portion of his hits that went to the center and the right side in this season from last year. “It is rare even in the U.S. for a player to push-hit a pitch that has been thrown to a section completely outside the strike zone, and hit a homer,” said Lotte Giants pitcher Josh Lindblom, who gave Park a homer to the central right this season. “Since Park Byeong-ho does not hit the ball after reading pitchers’ habits, it would be rather better for him to delay his hitting timing,” Nexen Manager Yeom Gyeong-yeop said.

“In the Major League, pitchers are getting increasingly stronger than batters in general,” commentator Kim said. “When facing the type of pitchers who seek head-on game by banking on ball speeds, it would be more effective to swing accurate batting even though timing is delayed.