The KBO said on Monday that Kang Min-ho (39) of Samsung has been named the MVP of July. “I didn’t expect to win the award,” said Kang Min-ho, who met him before the match against KIA in Gwangju on Sunday. He said he thought it was over because he won the MVP award in July.
Kang Min-ho, who is hard to explain even by the word “rejuvenation,” had a batting average of 0.408, 11 homers, 26 RBIs and a slugging percentage of 0.868 in 20 games in July. He garnered 14 out of 25 votes cast by reporters and 125,997 votes from fans, narrowly beating over runner-up Kim Do-young (37.56 points) with a total score of 40.24. It is the first time that he has won a monthly MVP award in his professional career over 20 years.스포츠토토
Kang Min-ho said, “Kim Do-young is spending the season chewing up the league again, so I was honestly satisfied with the team’s monthly schedule,” adding, “I personally felt very good to be a candidate for a competition with Kim Do-young even if it’s a monthly basis. I’m also proud to compete with that young player for just this month. I was thinking that I couldn’t beat Kim Do-young.”
However, his remarks are very humble. He is now in his 40s. Moreover, he is a catcher who consumes a lot of physical strength. The fact that such a player can achieve such a good performance in July when the heat wave is raging is a testament to his unchanging class. The same is true with his overall performance this year. Kang has played in 106 games through Saturday this season, posting an outstanding batting average of 0.311, 15 homers, 62 RBIs, and 0.881 on-base plus slugging percentage (OPS).
They were worried because the ball didn’t float well until June. Kang Min-ho also said, “I didn’t get many fly balls in the first half. I was thinking why I keep getting ground balls when I hit the ball naturally.” However, the situation completely changed in July. Kang also scratched his head saying it was difficult to explain well to himself. Even if you play in a professional baseball league for more than 20 years, you will never know.
Kang Min-ho said, “I didn’t have anything different to my surprise either. I’ll tell you if I changed my batting form or anything, but nothing changed,” adding, “I didn’t play much in May, so I thought maybe I’ll have a chance someday, and I wanted to do my best to prepare what I could, but I think I got better than myself because the good times were right.” Kang Min-ho explained that the batting speed was maintained, so at some point, the number of home runs soared as the ball came up.
It seems as if he is going back in time. Until he hit 0.258 with 13 home runs in 2022, some critics said that the era of Kang Min-ho, the most famous offensive catcher in the league, is nearing an end. However, he rebounded from 125 games in 2023 with a batting average of 0.290 with 16 home runs and 77 RBIs, and this year he is poised to achieve better performance than last year’s. “He did not run away,” Kang said calmly about the driving force.
In fact, he was not always consistent during his Lotte days and during his Samsung years. There were also bad times when I couldn’t remember well in the accumulated 20 years. Kang Min-ho also nodded and said, “Some seasons don’t come out as much as he prepared for one season, and some seasons come out more than he prepared for himself,” adding, “I think it helped my career build up by not trying to avoid that difficult moment after playing for 20 years.”
When I was in a slump, I played as I did as I did well. I did not hide behind him. I was gently criticized and cheered. I gained a lot from what I realized in the process. “As a person, I want to hide, run away, and avoid when things don’t work out for me. But at times like that, I just didn’t avoid it. I think there is a season where there is such a twist as I keep doing it, thinking that a bad time will come.” It is easy to say, but it is hard to put into practice.
Kang has played more than 2,000 games, hit 2,000 hits, hit 300 home runs, and posted 1,000 RBIs. He has accumulated a record that could make his first turn in the KBO League if the Hall of Fame is established in the future. He is a catcher who will be able to make history in the KBO League. Kang said, “My third contract as an individual FA ends next year. I want to try the fourth one, too. I want to show my juniors that I can do it even if I am over 40 years old.” Playing in 2,500 games as a catcher is also Kang’s last goal. Knowing the common truth that “there are good times and there are times when they are not,” Kang is the right person to walk toward that great feat. We are still living in the era of Kang.