The wait is over: LG Twins beat KT Wiz to win Korean Series

LG Twins end 29-year wait for Korean Series title with a 6-2 win over KT Wiz. Go Woo-suk closes out Game 5 for the Twins, leading the team to victory.

The LG Twins celebrate after beating the KT Wiz in Game 5 to win the 2023 Korean Series 4-1 at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in southern Seoul on Monday. [NEWS1]

Go Woo-suk was four years old the last time the LG Twins reached the Korean Series. He was not even born the last time they won it. And on Monday he stepped up to the mound to deliver the three historic outs that finally put the Seoul club back on top.

With the dugout watching his every move with bated breath, Go closed out Game 5 for the Twins on Monday, holding a 6-2 win over the KT Wiz to end a 29-year wait and secure the Korean Series title.

LG Twins closer Go Woo-suk pitches at the top of the ninth inning in Game 5 of the Korean Series at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in southern Seoul on Nov. 13. [YONHAP]

Go, 25, was one of six Twins players in the lineup on Monday that had never lived through an LG Korean Series win. The second-youngest on the team, Go was not even a twinkle in someone’s eye when the Twins beat the Pacific Dolphins on that historic night 29 years ago. Only infielder Moon Bo-gyeong is younger, at 23.

Now both are part of the Twins’ new golden age. Led by captain Oh Ji-hwan — who has played for the Twins since 2009 and may even be old enough to remember 1994 — LG have snapped the second-longest championship drought in KBO history to claim both the pennant and Korean Series title.

The LG Twins dugout reacts as pitcher Go Woo-suk gets the third out to end Game 5 of the Korean Series and secure the Twins the title at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in southern Seoul on Monday. [NEWS1]

That long, long road to victory culminated in a fairly easy win on Monday, capitalizing on a good third and fifth inning and a strong performance on the mound to shut down the Wiz and take their fourth straight win in Game 5 of the seven-game series.

Twins’ ace Casey Kelly gave up one run in five innings of work, allowing his club to take an insurmountable lead to lock in the final game for the Korean Series title.

Oh was named Korean Series MVP with three home runs and eight RBIs. Earlier in the series, Oh became the first player ever to homer in three straight Korean Series games.

That title comes with 10 million won ($7,500) in prize money and a very historic watch.

In 1998, Koo Bon-moo, the then-chairman of LG Group, bought a gold Rolex as a reward for the next LG player to be named Korean Series MVP. Nobody at the time knew it would be a 25-year wait before the watch was claimed, although Oh ultimately refused to accept it and instead said it should be given to current LG Chairman Koo Kwang-mo in memory of his late father.

A rolex purchased by late LG Group Chairman Koo Bon-moo to be given to the next LG Twins Korean Series MVP is displayed after Game 5 of the Korean Series at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in southern Seoul on Monday. [NEWS1]

The Twins started the Korean Series off on the wrong foot, losing the opener 3-2 on home turf at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in southern Seoul. They bounced back in the second game, winning 5-4, and then took that momentum on the road to beat the Wiz 8-7 in Suwon on Friday, before a big 15-4 blowout win on Saturday.

Monday’s win snaps the second-longest run without a championship title in the history of the KBO. The Twins had not earned the championship title since they defeated the Pacific Dolphins — later the Hyundai Unicorns and now nothing but history — in 1994.

Only the Lotte Giants have been without the Korean Series title for longer, having last won in 1992. That particular drought looks set to continue, with the Giants failing to make the playoffs for the last six seasons.

A sellout crowd of 23,750 fans attended the game at Jamsil on Monday as temperatures dropped close to zero degrees Celsius. The party atmosphere continued in Seoul long after the game ended, the trophy was awarded and the piles of paper streamers were swept away.

The Twins are one of the five remaining teams that founded the KBO back in 1982, although at the time they were owned by broadcaster MBC and played as the MBC Chungryong.

Alongside the OB Bears (now the Doosan Bears), the Haitai Tigers (now the Kia Tigers), the Lotte Giants, the Samsung Lions and the now-defunct Sammi Superstars, the Twins were there from the very birth of the KBO — although they finished third in that opening season.

The LG Twins celebrate after beating the KT Wiz in Game 5 to win the 2023 Korean Series 4-1 at Jamsil Baseball Stadium in southern Seoul on Monday. [NEWS1]

Like the four other remaining teams, that pedigree has earned the Twins a particularly devoted fan base — although it’s been a long time since they had much to celebrate.

Over the years, the Twins have seen little success when it comes to silverware.

Although they saw some results when the KBO played with different formats — in 1983 they won the second half split and in 2000 they topped the Magic League, one of two four-team leagues at the time — the Twins have only actually topped a full-length, all-team KBO table twice, in 1990 and 1994.

On both occasions, the Twins went on to win the Korean Series title as well, adding the championship to the pennant for the only four major trophies the club has ever won.

Since 1994, the club has increasingly found itself playing second fiddle to the Bears, a rival that older Twins fans still see as a usurper to the Seoul baseball crown.

While the Twins were founded in Seoul in 1982, the Bears started their life down in Daejeon, moving to the capital in 1985 and eventually joining the Twins at Jamsil Baseball Stadium a year later in 1986, the two teams sharing a home ever since.

The Kiwoom Heroes, the third Seoul team, was not founded until 2008, leaving the Twins as the original Seoul club — even if a lot of people that aren’t LG fans have already forgotten the fact.

But despite LG’s pedigree, it was the Bears that shone for years. Since that 1994 season, the Bears have topped the table four times and taken the Korean Series title five times, missing out on the playoffs just three times between 2004 and 2021.

This year the Bears finished in fifth place, behind the NC Dinos in fourth, the SSG Landers in third and the Wiz in second.

The Bears managed to stretch the Wildcard Series to two games, but ultimately fell to the Dinos, who went on to sweep the Landers but fell to the Wiz over five games in the final round of the playoffs. The Wiz advanced to the Korean Series where they fell foul of the resurgent Twins.

The final five fit the recent trajectory of the KBO, even if some changes in recent years were expected to rock the boat.

Over the last four seasons, the Bears, Dinos, Wiz and Landers have won a Korean Series each, with the Bears also appearing in two more as the challenger. The arrival of all four in the playoffs this year suggests that they, alongside the newly-dominant Twins, are likely to be contenders for a while.

This year the Twins have reclaimed their title as the kings of Seoul, taking both the pennant and the Korean Series trophies back to Jamsil — and this time on the Twins side of the stadium.

BY JIM BULLEY [jim.bulley@joongang.co.kr]