Raúl Alcántara Leads Doosan Over Choi Sung-Young and NC
Major League Baseball may be returning within the next month, but in South Korea, the KBO keeps on playing. ESPN continues to broadcast its games and is helping to fill the void that the MLB labor dispute has created.
In a matchup between the top-ranked NC Dinos and the 3rd-ranked Doosan Bears, the Bears emerged victorious by a score of 12–3 after Raúl Alcántara threw 7.1 IP of 3-run ball, giving the Doosan offense the chance to take the game in the 8th-inning. Opposing Alcántara was 23-year-old Choi Sung-young who had 6 effective innings, allowing 3 runs, leaving the Dinos within striking distance, but they were unable to capitalize in the long run.
This is the second time that I’ve seen Alcántara in the last week (read about the first here). He didn’t quite match his 8-inning, 1-run outing against the LG Twins, but the Dinos are a much more potent offense than LG. NC leads the KBO in most of the offensive categories, ranking 1st in runs per game, 2nd in hits per game, and 1st in HR per game while the LG Twins rank 6th, 6th, and 4th in those categories.
He pitched almost identical games in these two starts, throwing a good percentage of strikes, getting some swings and misses, and getting outs off of balls in play. This start continues a recent streak of strong performances for Alcántara who started the season unevenly; in his last 4 starts, he’s given up just 8 runs in 28.1 IP, which translates to a 2.54 ERA, which is better than the 3.70 ERA and 3.89 FIP that he entered the game with.
Alcántara sports five pitches, but primarily used 3 of them against the Bears, with his changeup and curveball making (very) brief cameos. He threw 2 types of fastballs a combined 64% of the time, more than he did against the Twins. His 4-seam, which he threw around 42% of the time, comes in around 94 mph, touching 95, 96, and even 97 over the course of his outing. His sinker, primarily used against right-handed hitters (RHH) came in just a tick slower, at 93 mph, with a bit of arm side run. His most reliable secondary pitch was his slider at about 86 mph, with a lot of vertical drop and very little side-to-side movement. He only threw his curveball twice, abandoning it after giving up a solo HR on a hanging curve in the 4th inning. He didn’t throw his changeup, around 86 mph, much more, only using it 9% of the time.
One thing that has interested me about watching Alcántara pitch is how he attacks hitters. Despite velocity that is the highest in the KBO, he only had a Whiff rate of 17% in both starts I’ve seen and just 7.55 K/9 this season. He relies on letting his defense work and inducing soft contact and that’s evident from a look at his pitch locations against the Dinos.
He pitches in the zone a lot, locating his fastball in the zone and on the outside corner against RHH, using his sinker to come back up and in. Alcántara located his fastball down and away from RHH, which led to a lot of the ground balls he was able to induce against NC. Attacking low-and-away to RHH, which is down-and-in to LHH, Alcántara was able to control the results against him.
He did give up 2 HRs, one coming off of a curveball that didn’t break up in the zone and the other on a fastball up that Aaron Altherr crushed, but, of the 8 flyouts, he allowed, none of them were hit very hard, with 6 being lazy pop-outs. That’s been a consistent theme for Alcántara this season, according to Baseball Info Solutions, he ranks about average on hard, medium, and soft contact allowed, but that’s been coming down as he’s pitched better. When he allowed hard contact, it’s primarily been on the ground, letting his defense have a shot at making the play (or on a mistake, which happens occasionally, as mistakes do).
Hitters should be sitting fastball in the zone, waiting for Alcántara to miss up over the plate. Alcántara, despite his velocity, isn’t likely to try and induce a lot of Whiffs and is willing to allow contact. The velocity and timing up the fastball may be an issue early on but should get better as the outing continues and hitters see him for the 2nd, 3rd, even 4th times. With how fastball heavy he is, you’re almost guaranteed a heater; the only problem is hitting it on time and in the air.
Raúl Alcántara’s counterpart, Choi Sung-Young also won’t try to blow a fastball by you, likely because he can’t!
This is the second time I’ve seen Choi pitch against Doosan and he performed much better this go around, with 6 IP and 3-runs allowed versus the 3.2 IP and 4 runs that he posted against the Bears in early June.
While Raúl Alcántara throws his fastball around 94/95 mph, Choi Sung-Young tops out around 86 on his fastball (that’s a slider for Alcántara!), throwing it around 49% of the time. His primary secondary pitch was his slider, throwing it 35% of the time around 78 mph. His changeup and curveball came in around 76 and 74 mph and were utilized 9% and 5% of the time. Choi’s really a two-pitch pitcher and, as I wrote a few weeks ago, “There just wasn’t anything exciting about any of those pitches.” Choi’s arsenal is pretty underwhelming and it showed with his low Whiff rate of 14%, albeit higher than the 10% he had last time against the Bears.
Choi threw both his fastball and side-to-side slider in the zone a lot, but commonly missed on the edges and never really got many of those calls for strikes. The Doosan offense, which is second to the NC offense in runs per game and first in hits per game, put a lot of hard-hit fly balls in the air, with one leaving the park for an HR. The NC defense took care of the others, with Aaron Altherr snagging a fly ball in the left-center gap, the first baseman catching a line drive, and so on. That’s been a consistent theme for the Dinos, with 3 of their 4 qualified starting pitchers having FIPs that are 1+ run worse than their ERAs.
Letting the defense work isn’t a bad thing when you’ve got a good one, but I don’t think it’s sustainable for Choi to continue that approach. According to Baseball Info Solutions, he’s allowing a hard-hit rate of 26%, which would be the 4th-worst hard-hit rate among pitchers with 100+ at-bats against. Choi hasn’t faced that many hitters, but it’s worth noting that he does give up a lot of hard contact. Combine that with his 9 fly outs versus 3 ground outs, that’s not a good sign for the rest of the way for Choi and it’s already reared its head with 2.53 HR/9 this season.
Overall, Choi has struggled a little with his command, throwing 42% of his pitches for a ball against Doosan and walking 3.37 hitters per 9 IP this season. Hitters should wait for Choi to prove that he can throw strikes consistently. Once he does so, he doesn’t throw super hard, allowing hitters enough time to adjust between expecting fastball/slider. For Choi, I’d like to see him work lower in the zone to try and induce softer ground balls. As the season goes on, I don’t think that allowing that much hard-contact and fly balls will be a sustainable approach for success.
*Stats from FanGraphs, myKBO.com, and Baseball Info Solutions*
