NC Dinos pitcher Shin Min-hyuk recorded his first win against LG in his debut with a quality start plus performance after one year.
Shin Min-hyuk pitched as the starting pitcher in the game against LG held at Seoul's Jamsil Stadium on the 19th, throwing 7 innings with 3 hits, 1 walk, 1 hit by pitch, and 7 strikeouts without allowing a run, leading to a win for NC, which triumphed 3-0.
Shin Min-hyuk recorded a quality start plus for the first time in a year since pitching 7 innings (2 earned runs) against Doosan on June 20 last year. This marked the first 7-inning shutout since August 28, 2022, when he pitched 7 scoreless innings against KT.
NC had a heavy bullpen workload on the 17th and 18th. Shin Min-hyuk alleviated the bullpen burden by pitching 7 innings. He threw 11 fastballs, 49 changeups, 21 cutters, and 10 forks, showing impressive control with his primary weapon, the changeup.
Shin Min-hyuk ended the first and second innings with consecutive three-up, three-down outs. There were no balls hit out of the infield. In the third inning, he struck out Lee Ju-heon swinging with a cutter (130 km/h) and Lee Young-bin swinging with a changeup (121 km/h). He allowed Park Hae-min to reach base with a hit by pitch, but struck out Shin Min-jae with a cutter (134 km/h) to finish the inning with 'KKK'.
In the fourth inning, after two outs, he allowed his first hit to Moon Bo-gyeong. Shin Min-hyuk ended the inning by getting Moon Sung-ju to ground out to first base. After one out in the fifth inning, he allowed a single to Lee Ju-heon but continued to maintain the scoreless inning by striking out Lee Young-bin and Park Hae-min consecutively.
In the sixth inning, he allowed a single to leading batter Shin Min-jae. He got Kim Hyun-soo to pop out to the shortstop, Austin to pop out to left field, and ended the inning getting Moon Bo-gyeong to pop out to third base. Shin Min-hyuk, who also pitched in the seventh, allowed one walk but managed to avoid any runs.
After the game, Shin Min-hyuk said, 'I felt comfortable today because I was in sync with Hyung-jun, and having a good strike ratio on the first pitch helped me finish the inning more quickly.'
Before this game, his overall performance against LG was 8 games with 0 wins and 2 losses, and an earned run average of 4.33. He secured his first win against LG. Shin Min-hyuk said, 'I knew and was always conscious of it. I really wanted to win today. The coach also told me to be confident today and to be comfortable even if I get hit. Hearing that made me feel even more at ease.'
Shin Min-hyuk said, 'I always thought I would throw a lot of changeups when I pitch, so I started with some splitters early on, and after 2 to 3 innings passed, Hyung-jun started signaling for the changeup a lot. I think I was able to achieve good results because I was trying to throw it even lower.'
It has been a year since I pitched 7 innings. It has been 3 years since I achieved a 7-inning shutout. Shin Min-hyuk said, 'I knew it, and I wanted to pitch 7 innings, but I always couldn't. As a starting pitcher, when the foreign players (pitch) 7 innings, I definitely wanted to pitch 7 innings too. I was trying to save my pitch count, but it didn't go well, but I think I was able to trust my defense and it worked well today.'
With a 3-0 lead in the seventh inning, with one out and one on, he got hit hard by Austin. It was a home run-quality hit, but it fell short, and the left fielder caught it before the fence. Shin Min-hyuk said, 'I thought it was a home run at first. I was trying to throw the changeup low, but I was lucky that Austin's timing was off, and it hit the end of the bat.'
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