Opportunity or Crisis for Park?

Chan H. Park of Texas Rangers will confront Big Unit Randy Johnson of Arizona Diamondbacks for the first time.

Texas Rangers manager Buck Showalter changed Park`s rotation schedule yesterday. Park was originally scheduled to pitch today against San Francisco Giants. Now, he will take on Diamondbacks tomorrow. Manager Showalter explained that Rangers catcher Chad Kreuter needs one more day to team up with Park due to his thigh injury, and Park also needs some rest since he has pitched quite a lot in bullpen.

Diamondbacks will put Randy Johnson on the mound. This is the first time ever, whether regular or exhibition, Park confronts Johnson on the mound, and Johnson will be the strongest opponent.

Looking at the thundering balls of Johnson, no one would believe that Randy is in his 40s. He throws only two types of balls: fast balls reaching up to 160km, and sliders hovering over 150km. Due to his unique pitching style and the almost no difference in speed between the two, Johnson poses a great difficulty to the batters. On top of that, his tall statue with scary look is enough to "threaten" hitters.

In addition, it was Johnson who swept all the titles a pitcher could have last year: most winning record (24 wins), 2.32 ERA and 334 strikeouts. As a result, he won the National League`s Cy Young Award last year, his fourth one in a row. Throughout his career, he has won the award five times.

In terms of the name value, Park is way below. Nonetheless, it is more of an opportunity to Park. He could make up for the loss of his reputation by winning over Johnson. To our dismay, Park failed to demonstrate himself in the last two exhibition games to reinstate his image ruined last year. For the past two games, he allowed 10 hits and 11 points in 4 and 2/3 innings. Consequently, his ERA disappointingly came to 21.21. Thus, it is uncertain whether he could pitch in the season opening game. Thus, if he comes out as a winner in the upcoming battle, he could wipe out all the smears by one stroke.

Despite the performance, Rangers owner John Hart showed his confidence in Park and said, "As he did in the past, he would pitch more than 220 innings in about 34 games. And he will bring lots of victories for our team."

In the meanwhile, Hee S. Choi, who has secured the first base, demonstrated excellent performance against Oakland Athletics, punching 2 hits and 2 points yesterday.

On the other hand, Lee Seung-yup of Samsung and Shim Jung-soo of Hyundai wrapped up their brief ML careers yesterday with the Marlines v. Baltimore Orleans game. They have played for Florida Marlines so far on invitation. Lee recorded a batting average of 0.200, along with 2 homers and 3 RBI in 10 games, while Shim 0.308 with one home run and three points in 9 games.

Sang-Soo Kim ssoo@donga.com