Confirming the championship title early on eased the burden on the team's performance. Now, the remaining games are time to focus solely on challenging the milestone. KIA Tigers' "superstar" Kim Do-young (21) will challenge the new history of the KBO League in the remaining seven games.
KIA lost 0-2 to SSG Landers of the 2024 Shinhan SOL Bank KBO League at SSG Landers Field in Incheon on the 17th. KIA, which had left the magic number "1" to win the regular season, fell into place due to the defeat, but the magic number disappeared as the Doosan Bears beat the second-ranked Samsung Lions 8-4, confirming the regular season title.
This is the seventh time that KIA has won the regular season championship based on a single league, including when it was with the Haitai Tigers. The last championship was in 2017, when KIA beat Doosan, which had been chasing until the end, by two games to secure the top spot in the regular season, and went straight to the Korean Series to enjoy the joy of winning the unified championship.
If you name the person who contributed the most to the victory, he is by far the first in the team. Kim, who played his first full-time season this year in his third year as a pro, has full potential, dubbed the "second Lee Jong-beom." He played in 134 games through Thursday, posting a batting average of 0.344 (178 hits in 517 at-bats), 37 homers, 105 RBIs, 134 runs and 39 steals, showing his outstanding batting performance in the core batting line of the Kia Tigers. It is no exaggeration to say that Kia has effectively named the MVP by winning the championship during the regular season.
As Kia has secured the championship title with seven more games to go, Kim can now become a little more greedy. He is now challenging himself to set a new record.
This season, Kim Do-young set a number of records that will remain in the history of the KBO League. Starting with the first 10 home runs-10 steals per month in the KBO League in April, he joined the 20-20 club in the fifth first half of his career, the minimum at-bats (4 at-bats) natural cycling hit, the youngest 30 home runs-30 steals, the youngest record for the youngest home run in a single season (Lee Seung-yeop's 32 home runs in 1997), and the third 30 home runs-30 steals-100 RBIs and 100 runs are hard to list.
The record-setting streak is not over yet. A milestone to mark a milestone in history is just around the corner. The first thing that Kim is likely to achieve is the record of the most goals scored in a single season. Kim has just one point behind Seo Geon-chang's 135 points recorded by the Nexen Heroes at the time in 2014. If he only scores two more points in the remaining seven games, he will set a new record for the most goals scored in a single season in the KBO league.
The record that draws the most attention is also "40 Home Runs - 40 Steals." In the history of the KBO League, Eric Thames (47 Home Runs - 40 Steals) of the NC Dinos in 2015 is the only player who joined the 40-40 Club. If Kim Do-young steps down, he will be the second player in history and the first Korean batter to achieve the record. Kim Do-young, who did not show his desire for a record throughout the season, did not hide his aspiration for the milestone, saying, "I want to have a ceremony to pick the base like Thames when 40-40 is just around the corner."
Kim, 메이저놀이터 who had 35 homers until last Saturday, felt that his 40th homer was far away. However, he hit multiple homers in the game against the KT Wiz on Sunday, and immediately approached his 40th homer three steps ahead. Stolen bases with a whopping 90.7 percent success rate (43 attempts / 4 failed attempts) can be stolen whenever he decides to make up his mind. Now he has only three homers left.