The year 2024 was regrettable for both Lee Jung-hoo (San Francisco Giants) and the San Francisco Giants. San Francisco, which reinforced its strength by signing contracts with several big players ahead of the 2024 season, also recorded another season of looting (a season with a winning rate of less than 500), realizing the imbalance in objective power. It only ranked fourth in the National League with 80 wins and 82 losses (.494), realizing it has a long way to go.먹튀검증

In the midst of the bumpy season was Lee Jung-hoo's injury. Lee, who signed a six-year contract worth $113 million ahead of the 2024 season, was San Francisco's biggest contract in the offseason. At the time, San Francisco had problems such as a lack of overall offense, a drop in batting average on the left-handed line, and a below-average center field defense, and Lee was a rising star who could solve these problems at once. It was not for nothing that San Francisco gave Lee, who had never played in a single game in the U.S., more than $100 million.

San Francisco signed a six-year contract with Lee Jung-hoo, and had high expectations on Lee's excellent contact ability, attack as a leadoff, and center fielder's defense, which is considered to be above the league average. It is expected that Lee Jung-hoo will continue to play in 2024, adapt to the ball of major league pitchers who are much higher than the KBO League, and will show his true value from 2025.

However, not long after the season started, San Francisco's plan had a big crack. It was Lee Jung-hoo's injury. Lee, who had been gradually adapting himself to the league, collapsed while playing defense in the first inning against the Cincinnati Reds at Oracle Park on May 13 (Korea time). With the determination to catch a homerun-like hit, he attempted a jump catch at the last minute, but in the process, he hit his left shoulder heavily against the fence.

It could not be said that it was Lee Jung-hoo's fault, but the outcome was the worst. It turned out that his shoulder joint was damaged. After his team doctor's diagnosis, he flew to Los Angeles to meet Dr. Neil Elatrice, an authority in the field, but the findings were the same. Fundamentally, surgery was needed to solve this problem. San Francisco did not want to take the plunge. Even if the season ended here, the remaining five years of the contract were more valuable. I rather had the surgery early and had a normal start to the 2025 season. That's how Lee Jung-hoo ended the season unfortunately.

Lee's 2024 performance did not improve at 37 games. He only posted a batting average of 0.262, an on-base percentage of 0.310, a slugging percentage of 0.331, two homers, eight RBIs, and an OPS (on-base plus slugging percentage) of 0.641. In fact, the slump in the early days of the season could have been foreseen to some extent, and it may have been in the San Francisco Giants' plan. As it was his first season in the U.S., he decided that he needs to adapt himself to at least a half-season at the earliest or a season at the most. Lee suffered an injury by the time he got some adjustment to the Major League stage, and he lost the opportunity to adapt to the situation more, ending the season intactly. I felt more regretful about this part than about his performance that fell short of expectations.

He played in only 37 matches and had a long hiatus. For Lee, it is now practically like starting his debut season again. As he just passed the half-season, he could be under pressure to show his capabilities as a player. However, expectations remain for Lee. Last year, he had too few samples, which makes it difficult to evaluate his performance as such. Rather, the local community does not hide expectations that Lee will be of great help to the team's strength this year. While it is true that young players such as Luis Matos and Eliot Ramos played active roles during Lee's injury period, Lee's position is not threatening. Lee said, "All we have to do is show our capabilities.

The outlook for the 2025 season is more positive than expected. Despite the sluggish performance last year, some statistical projections do not put much emphasis on Lee's 2024 performance. The reason for this is that there are too few samples. In some cases, the team missed a chance to make up for the loss due to injury. "Steamer," one of the most well-known statistical projections, gave a generous score to Lee's 2025 performance. In a way, it does not reflect his 2024 performance, but is continuing to meet his expectations when he joined the team.

The "Steamer" assumes that Lee Jung-hoo will play 660 at-bats for 143 games this season. He means that he will definitely play as the main player. In the sample, Lee is expected to have a batting average of 0.294, an on-base percentage of 0.351, a slugging percentage of 0.438, 14 homers, 63 RBIs and 13 steals. The adjusted scoring capacity (wRC+) is expected to be 122%, which is about 22 percent higher than the league average. He is not a batter who hits a lot of home runs, nor is he a player whose gap between the batting average and the on-base percentage is typically large, but he is expected to contribute to his team's offense by making many hits through accurate contact anyway.

"Steamer" rated Lee's contribution to win (War) 4.1 in comparison to expected replacement. This figure represents the 30th among fielders in the Major League in the "Steamer" analysis for the entire 2025 as well. Lee was evaluated slightly below the league average in defense indicators and the league average in base running, but was expected to have a fairly high WAR as he was recognized for his offense power. Among the San Francisco fielders, he was followed by catcher Patrick Bailey (4.4), followed by Willy Adames (3.9) and Matt Chapman (3.8), who signed larger contracts than Lee. He identified four players as the core players of his team's lineup.

The 4.1 WAR is worth $30-40 million in recent trends. Lee Jung-hoo can be a sufficiently successful recruit.