Korea starter Dane Dunning smiles after retiring the side in the bottom of the third inning of an exhibition game before the World Baseball Classic against the Orix Buffaloes at Kyocera Dome in Osaka on March 3. [YONHAP]

Korea starter Dane Dunning smiles after retiring the side in the bottom of the third inning of an exhibition game before the World Baseball Classic against the Orix Buffaloes at Kyocera Dome in Osaka on March 3. [YONHAP]

 

Dane Dunning made a strong first impression in his Korea pitching debut Tuesday with a scoreless outing in the team’s final exhibition game against the Orix Buffaloes in Japan before the World Baseball Classic (WBC).

 

However, the five national team pitchers that followed him weren’t able to match Dunning’s quality and made things tighter than they should have been in what ended up being an 8-5 win for Korea.

 


The Korean team will now head over to Tokyo, with the first WBC Pool C contest set for 7 p.m. Thursday against Czechia at Tokyo Dome.

 

One of three U.S.-born players of Korean descent on the team, and with 136 big league games under his belt, Dunning held the Orix Buffaloes scoreless over three innings. He scattered three hits and struck out one.

 

The 31-year-old right-hander gave up a leadoff single to Yuma Mune but retired the next three batters, including a strikeout of No. 3 hitter Kotaro Kurebayashi.

 

In the second inning, Dunning allowed a one-out double to Taishi Hirooka but stranded him at second base by getting a groundout and a fly out.

 

Dunning found himself in trouble in the third, when a throwing error by shortstop Kim Ju-won and a fielding error by second baseman Kim Hye-seong put runners at the corners with nobody out.

 

Go Woo-suk of Korea returns to the dugout at Kyocera Dome in Osaka during an exhibition game prior to the World Baseball Classic against the Orix Buffaloes on March 3. [YONHAP]

Go Woo-suk of Korea returns to the dugout at Kyocera Dome in Osaka during an exhibition game prior to the World Baseball Classic against the Orix Buffaloes on March 3. [YONHAP]

 

Kim Hye-seong atoned for his miscue by making an over-the-shoulder grab on a pop fly off the bat of Ryoma Nishikawa. Kurebayashi popped out to Kim Ju-won, who then fielded a weak grounder by Ryo Ohta and got an easy force out at second to end the Buffaloes’ threat.

 

Korea manager Ryu Ji-hyun said before the game he wanted Dunning to cover two to three innings in around 45 pitches. Dunning responded by needing only 37 pitches to work his three innings.

 

“Coming into today’s game, the mindset was just attacking hitters, getting ahead of counts, getting myself in good situations and being able to mix pitches, and do my thing,” Dunning said. “[Catcher] Park Dong-won did a phenomenal job of making me feel comfortable, making it where the pitch calling was phenomenal, utilizing my changeup, utilizing the sliders and cutter at the right time and being really aggressive when we needed to.”

 

Under WBC eligibility rules, players can represent the country of birth for one of their parents, even if the players themselves aren’t from that country. Dunning, whose mother is from Korea, would have pitched for her home country at the 2023 WBC if not for an injury.

 

“Wearing the uniform is a complete honor. It’s an unbelievable experience for me just being able to represent my mom and my mom’s side of the family,” he said. “It’s something I wanted to do back in 2023 and unfortunately, I wasn’t able to. But now I get to and [I’m] extremely excited for it.”

 

You Yeong-chan of Korea walks off the mound at Kyocera Dome in Osaka during an exhibition game prior to the World Baseball Classic against the Orix Buffaloes on March 3. [YONHAP]

You Yeong-chan of Korea walks off the mound at Kyocera Dome in Osaka during an exhibition game prior to the World Baseball Classic against the Orix Buffaloes on March 3. [YONHAP]

 

Korea erupted for six runs in the top of the second inning and led 6-0 when the bullpen took over to begin the fourth. And that’s when trouble started brewing.

 

Left-hander Song Seung-ki walked the first batter he faced and couldn’t even complete the fourth inning. After Song allowed a two-run single to Mune, right-hander Go Woo-suk came on to try to put out the fire, only to walk in a run to make it a 6-3 game.

 

Go settled down and retired the next four batters before another lefty, Kim Young-kyu, began the sixth inning. He also issued a free pass and only got bailed out by a double play ball off Mune’s bat.

 

Korea’s fifth pitcher, righty Jo Byeong-hyeon, escaped a bases-loaded jam in the seventh inning, when things nearly unraveled after Jo issued a one-out walk.

 

You Yeong-chan took the mound in the eighth and surrendered two runs that cut Korea’s lead to 7-5. He allowed a single, a walk and a wild pitch before a sacrifice fly and another hit brought Orix within two runs.

 

Korea’s plan was to cover nine innings with six pitchers. When You’s adventures prevented that, manager Ryu Ji-hyun had to resort to a couple of Japanese independent league pitchers to get the final four outs.

 

Ryu thanked those pitchers for preserving the win but did not get into any specifics about his troublesome bullpen.

 

“Over the past two days, I was able to get a closer look at our pitchers,” Ryu said. “We’ll do our work tomorrow and get ready for our first game on Thursday.”

Yonhap