“Ace” has returned to the mound of Suwon KT Wiz Park. KT Wiz right-hander Young-gun So Hyung-joon announced a successful return after a hiatus of more than a year.스포츠토토
Cho Hyung-joon, who joined KT as the first designated player in 2020, won the Rookie of the Year award with 13 wins, 6 losses and a 3.86 ERA in 133 innings in 26 games during his debut season, and contributed greatly to the team’s first unified championship the following year. Continuing that trend through 2022, he was responsible for one of the pillars of KT’s starting lineup for three years.
It was last year that Cho had a big ordeal. At the match against the Suwon LG Twins on April 2, his first appearance in the 2023 season, Cho was sluggish in two ⅓ innings with 10 hits, two outs and one strikeout, and nine runs, and was listed as injured due to a sprained right arm muscle. After recovering, he was on the first team, but ended the season early due to rupture of the medial collateral ligament in his right elbow.
Cho Hyung-joon, who has devoted himself to recovery and rehabilitation after elbow ligament joint surgery (Tommy John surgery), seemed to start his return to the game with live pitching in mid-May, but was diagnosed with micro-damage to the outer flexor muscle of his right elbow during a Futures League game in early June. Considering the time required for recovery and actual inspection, his return to the game was canceled in the first half.
Cho Hyung-joon, who devoted his energy to rehabilitation, raised his sense of play by pitching live on the 31st of last month and taking the mound in the Futures League on the 4th and 7th of this month. And he came up to the first team ahead of the home game against the NC Dinos on the 10th.
Since his return to the primary league, So has pitched in relief in all four games, not as a starter, with one win and an ERA of 1.80 in five innings. After allowing one run with one hit (one homer) and one out in one inning against NC Dinos on Saturday, which was his first pitching, he pitched scoreless innings against the Kia Tigers on Sunday, the Suwon Samsung Lions on Sunday, and the Suwon SSG Landers on Sunday. As he had a long hiatus, So is expected to continue playing as a bullpen pitcher for the rest of the season. Even if his team advances to the postseason, he will not likely start as a starter.
Cho Hyung-joon, who met reporters ahead of the home game against SSG on the 21st, said, “I have no greed to be a starter at all. As I am not ready to prolong the innings, I will do my best by throwing one or two innings without greed this year.”
He also felt grateful for the bullpen pitchers. He said, “I think bullpen pitchers are really hard. The starting pitcher has a strange feeling of tension from the evening before he leaves the game until before he takes the mound, and bullpen pitchers have to feel that every day. That’s why the fatigue level has been higher since the end of the game. I think that’s why it’s a bit difficult because there are situations where you warm up and then don’t go to the game, and then you don’t warm up and then have to take the mound in a hurry.”
He didn’t forget to mention closing pitcher Park Young-hyun, who is two years behind Yoo and is in charge of keeping the back door open for this season. “I can’t say for sure, but don’t the middle pitchers feel more fatigued than the closing pitcher? The middle pitchers have been wearing spikes since the national protocol, and (Park) wears spikes at around the fourth inning while stretching inside. He seems much more comfortable these days,” Cho said.
His physical condition is not bad. “I’m still lacking (my current physical condition) when it comes to perfect condition, but I’m still getting better after the surgery,” Cho said. “I can’t say that I’m satisfied with the results. I just think it’s a process to take the mound for rehabilitation, so I have significance in throwing the ball from the mound,” Cho said. “After the surgery, I didn’t feel that I was not able to control the ball, and if the ball has the sensitivity to pain as I thought, the movement will decrease, so I’m paying more attention to that part.”
It was the first time that he experienced a long hiatus since entering the professional stage. There was also a regret that he could not throw the ball, but he had enough time to look back on himself. In particular, Cho Hyung-joon says that “reading” helped him greatly.
Cho Hyung-joon said, “I didn’t know the importance when it was my daily routine to come to the ballpark to exercise and play games, but I think I learned the importance of that time as I couldn’t go to work even if I wanted to go to the ballpark for a year and four months. I also wanted to go back quickly,” adding, “I read a few books about mental in that situation, and every time I did, I felt better. So I think reading books helped me when I had bad thoughts or complicated feelings.”
Why did So Hyung-joon choose to read among his various hobbies, including games.