With military service on horizon, pitcher Jung Hai-young hopes to leave Tigers on positive note

DAEGU — Over the past three seasons, Kia Tigers reliever Jung Hai-young has gone from one of the top closers in Korean baseball to a pitcher who could no longer be trusted in key spots.

The fall has been jarring. In 2024, Jung became the first closer in KBO history to top the All-Star fan voting. He led the league with 31 saves that year and helped the Tigers win the Korean Series title.

In 2025, he picked up 27 saves — his fifth consecutive campaign with more than 20 saves.

But Jung got off to a rocky start in the 2026 season. He even spent time in the minor league and eventually lost his closer role midway through the campaign. He finished with a 6.12 ERA, by far the worst of his seven-year career, and settled for just two saves.

This year, he had a career-worst 34 earned runs in 50 innings. Two years ago, he allowed just 14 earned runs in 50 2/3 innings.

Jung had not been trusted in high-leverage situations this postseason until Monday night, during the first game of the second round against the Samsung Lions in Daegu. He was brought in on short notice in the bottom of the fifth inning after starter James Naile was automatically ejected for hitting an opposing hitter in the head.

Naile had been cruising, giving up just one hit, and the Tigers had staked a 5-0 lead. It may not have seemed like a tough spot for Jung, but he had to warm up quickly to prevent the Lions from gaining momentum, with anticipation building among the sellout crowd of 23,550.

Jung limited the damage to just a run, and the Tigers went on to win by 5-1. Manager Lee Bum-ho praised his work for helping the team steal the road win.

In the previous series against the LG Twins, relievers such as Sung Yeong-tak, Kwak Do-gyu, Cho Sang-woo and Jeon Sang-hyun had been in Lee’s circle of trust, with Jung only taking the ball when the Tigers had a comfortable lead during their three-game sweep.

Ahead of the series against the Lions, Jung said on Sunday that he had not quite figured out what had been ailing him this year.

“I think some of it is mental,” he said. “But if I knew the exact cause of my problems, I would have been out of my slump already. Baseball is such a tough game to crack. The more you play, the more difficult it gets. There are days when I feel great but get knocked around, and there are also days when I feel terrible but still get outs.”

Jung said that he was itching to take the mound when the Tigers were protecting slim leads in earlier games, but he acknowledged that he knew better pitchers were getting a chance in those spots.

“[Sung, Cho, Kwak and Jeon] have been unbelievable, and that is why I have not been getting chances to pitch,” he said. “So I’ve been putting in extra work to get ready and to join them. I know that I have not come close to meeting expectations, so I just have to be better. I’ve been feeling guilty all season about the way that I’ve been pitching, and I really want to do better in the postseason.”

Jung, who is scheduled to begin his mandatory military service in December, said that he wants to leave a more positive lasting impression on Tigers fans before his departure.

“I hope to get an opportunity to put my bad regular season out of people’s minds,” he said. “I don’t have that many games left to pitch in my Kia Tigers uniform — maybe four games maximum. I want to have a good finish.”

Yonhap