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Nexen on fire, Doosan fizzles out

May 21, 2012 - 19:13 By Korea Herald
A pair of baseball teams have seen the tide turn just a quarter into their season.

Through the sixth week of the season the Nexen Heroes have been on a hot streak with six consecutives wins, toppling both the Lotte Giants and the Samsung Lions.

The Nexen Heroes had mostly been in fifth before May 15 but after this week’s streak the club shot up to second just behind the SK Wyverns.

The team just might continue their run. They face the LG Twins starting Tuesday and the Hanwha Eagles starting Friday. Both teams lost a game against the Nexen Heroes when they faced off earlier in the season.

The Nexen’s Kang Jung-ho leads the batting charts with 13 homers, 32 RBIs and a .741 slugging average.

The Nexen Heroes placed last in the 2011 season.

On the flipside, the Doosan Bears are in freefall, from first to fifth place after a five-game losing streak against the Hanwha Eagles and the LG Twins. This is the lowest the Seoul team has been since the start of the season.

The star slugger so far this season, Kim Tae-kyun of the Hanwha Eagles, shows no sign of letting up on his phenomenal batting average.

After Sunday, the 29-year-old sits on top of a whopping .451 batting average, where he has been since the start of the season.

Kim not only dominates in terms of batting average, leaving the Samsung Lions’ Lee Seung-yup a distant second, but also leads in hits and OBP.

But no matter what Kim puts out, his team’s last place standing throughout the season is a harsh reminder that baseball is a team sport.

By Robert Lee (robert@heraldcorp.com)