Archive for Jung-Ho Kang

Injuries are an unfortunate part of most physical activities, and Major League Baseball is no exception. Players tear hamstrings running, their ACLs changing directions, and hurt their shoulders and elbows throwing. To the extent possible, those involved in the game do their very best to prevent injuries. Trainers and teams go to great lengths to strengthen and stretch out players so as many injuries as possible can be prevented. Innings and pitches are monitored to try to keep pitchers healthy.

Often, we might feel like throwing our arms up in the air and declare that prevention is impossible, but teams generally try to keep their players healthy. Whether the incentive is to achieve a greater moral good or keep valuable employees productive is debatable, but whenever an injury occurs that might be prevented, it draws attention. The attention does not focus entirely on the actual injury suffered, but whether it is possible to prevent similar future injuries. Chris Coghlan’s slide on a double play — a slide which resulted in a season-ending injury to Jung-ho Kang — is an example of the type of play and injury that spurs debate.

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Heading into the season, Kris Bryant enjoyed favored status when it came to predicting a National League Rookie of the Year. When FanGraphs writers were polled before the season, 20 of 36 votes went to the Chicago Cubs’ third baseman; seven went Joc Pederson; six were cast for Jorge Soler; Noah Syndergaard, Jung Ho Kang and Raisel Iglesias each got one. A couple months into the season, Pederson inserted himself into the race with 13 home runs by the end of May. As the year has moved on, Bryant and Pederson have come back to the pack a bit while Matt Duffy, Kang and Syndergaard have moved into the conversation for the NL’s top rookie. The award is no longer a two-horse battle, and all the players who have risen up are sure to see plenty of exposure since each of them is in the middle of a pennant race.

As Owen Watson wrote, this season has been a historic one for rookies, particularly position players. With Bryant and Pederson leading the way, the rookie class is producing at a greater level than any in the past decade. It’s likely the best class in nearly 30 years, back when Barry Bonds and Jose Canseco were rookies. In the past month, Bryant and Pederson have allowed a few other players to enter the race. Pederson — a three-true-outcomes player to begin the season — has removed the two positive outcomes over the past month, walking just 3% of the time and hitting only one home run. Bryant hasn’t fallen quite as far. He’s still drawing walks, but he is striking out nearly one-third of the time and has a wRC+ of 58 over the past 30 days. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s very rare for a Major League club to sign a presumed every-day starter to a contract that will total either 4 years/$17M (a sum that includes a 2019 buy-out plus posting fee) or 5 years/$21.5M (a sum that includes a 2019 team option plus posting fee). But, seeing as Jung-Ho Kang is the first position player to ever enter the MLB directly from Korea’s professional league, this is a rare case in which the most refined of projections are still guesses. Unknowns presently rule the day.

At Just a Bit Outside, during the brief period between when Pittsburgh had acquired negotiation rights but had not yet agreed with Kang himself, Rob Neyer had a bunch of questions about Kang’s fit within the Pirates’ line-up. Before the Pirates had acquired negotiation rights, Jeff also had a grip of questions about Kang’s abilities both offensively and defensively. Jeff wrote the following about Kang’s glovework:

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