Neither the ace selection card nor the bullpen all-out fight was useless. The Lotte Giants fell into a swamp for three consecutive losses and were on the verge of being eliminated from the fall baseball league.

Lotte lost 4-8 to the Hanwha Eagles of the 2024 Shinhan SOL Bank KBO League held at Hanwha Life Eagles Park in Daejeon on Sunday. Lotte (62 wins, 4 draws and 71 losses) which has recorded three consecutive wins, fell to eighth place by giving up its seventh place to Hanwha (64 wins, 2 draws and 72 losses).

Lotte, which was on the verge of being eliminated from the semifinals after losing two consecutive games to the LG Twins on the 18th and 19th, went all out after taking a two-day break due to the cancellation of rain. The early part of the game was Lotte's flow. In the top of the first inning, Hwang Sung-bin combined an infield hit, opponent's error, and wild pitch to create a chance for third base with no outs, and Victor Reyes scored the first run with a timely hit. In the third inning, he added one point with a wild pitch with one out and runners on the first and third bases, followed by a timely hit by Yoon Dong-hee with two outs to take a 3-0 lead.

Charlie Barnes, the starting pitcher who tied the Hanwha Eagles' lineup to 0 points through the fourth inning, lost his first point after being hit by a solo shot by An Chi-hong in the bottom of the fifth inning. Lotte again ran to 4-1 in the top of the sixth inning with Ko Seung-min's timely double with two outs and a runner on the second base.메이저놀이터

Having allowed one run in six innings, Barnes was shaken up sharply in the bottom of the seventh inning. Having had consecutive hits by Jang Jin-hyuk, Hwang Young-mook, and Lee Jae-won, Barnes is on the verge of loading the bases with no outs. Having given up one run due to Jonathan Peraza's ground ball to the third baseman, Barnes struck out Kwon Kwang-min with one out and runners on the first and third bases, and seized the second out count. However, Barnes failed to pass Moon, and gave up a timely hit to center field, allowing his team to pursue the team until 4-3.

In a crisis with two outs and runners on the first and second bases, Lotte put down Barnes and put in Han Hyun-hee, but failed to extinguish the fire. Han allowed Noh to tie the game at 4-4 with a timely hit, and even gave up a pitch to Chae Eun-seong, who was shaken. Kim Sang-soo, who took over the mound with the bases loaded with two outs, allowed Ahn Chi-hong to come from behind to end the game with four to five walks by pushing him to the eighth pitch. The Lotte Giants even deployed Chung to strike out Jang Jin-hyuk and managed to finish the seventh inning. As many as three bullpen pitchers had to be deployed to catch one out count.

In the bottom of the eighth inning, Chung treated Hwang Young-mook with a fly ball to the left field and handed over the mound to Koo. Koo, who allowed Lee Jae-won to get on base with a pitch, seemed to be overcoming the crisis by inducing Lee Jin-young to ground out to the shortstop. However, the situation, which could have been a double play due to Park's fatal catch error, has turned into a crisis with one out and runners on the first and second bases.

With left-handed hitters leading to Kwon Kwang-min and Moon Hyun-bin in front, Lotte added Song Jae-young instead of Koo Seung-min. Song handled Kwon Kwang-min with a fly ball to the third baseman, but gave up a walk to Moon Hyun-bin, who was on the verge of loading the bases with two outs. Against Choi In-ho, Song dominated the 1-2 advantageous count, but allowed a timely two-run hit on his slider at the fourth pitch. Lotte even put in the seventh pitcher Na Kyun-an, but Chae Eun-sung hit a timely hit to center field to extend the score to 4-8.

In the last attack in the top of the ninth inning, Lotte suffered a bitter taste of the 4-8 defeat as Reyes struck out, Ko Seung-min hit a fly ball to left field, and Son Ho-young grounded out to shortstop.

Since entering the postseason as the third-ranked regular season in 2017, Lotte has been at the bottom of the standings since 2018 with 7-10-7-8-8-7 ranking, and has not been able to reach the autumn baseball team. In recent seasons, they have been competing for tickets for the last round of five in the second half of the season, but they have often given Lotte fans hope advice as they have slipped due to lack of hindsight.

This year seems to be ending the season similarly to recent years. With seven more games to go until the end of the regular season, the gap is 4.5 games shorter than the fifth-ranked SSG Landers (68 wins, two draws and 68 losses, a winning rate of 0.500) who have won six consecutive games. Lotte, which is lagging behind sixth-ranked KT Wiz (69 wins, two draws and 70 losses, a winning rate of 0.496), is unlikely to advance to the post season even if it wins all of the remaining games. If this trend continues, chances are high that Lotte will fail to advance to the post season for seven consecutive seasons and add another password after 7-10-7-8-7.