This article is part of our DraftKings KBO series.
There was an bonus KBO slate Monday which didn't feature on DraftKings, but it turns out that it wouldn't have gone forward anyway, as rain washed away all but one game. The Giants defeated the Wiz by a 6-2 score thanks to Se Woong Park's six shutout innings in a game which was cut short in the middle of the seventh. Two of the rained out games got pushed back to Tuesday, turning what was supposed to be an unusual three-game slate into a standard five-game night, but DraftKings' contests will contain just the three originally-scheduled matchups. The Eagles-Bears and Landers-Lions games will not be included. That three-game slate could wind up shrinking, however, as both the Wiz-Giants and Twins-Dinos games look somewhat threatened by rain as of writing. With so few games to choose from, however, players from all three contests will feature in this column.
Pitchers
Je Seong Bae ($9,000) wouldn't normally earn top billing here, but he's the best among a small and generally mediocre group Tuesday. His 3.68 ERA this season isn't a whole lot better than the 3.95 mark he posted last year, but he's gotten there in a much more sustainable way. Bae struck out just 13.2 percent of opposing batters last year while walking 12.1 percent, hardly a recipe that typically leads to a sub-4.00 ERA. His walk rate is even worse this year at 13.1 percent, but that's come with a huge jump in strikeout rate, which sits at 22.0 percent. He's rarely been dominant this season but hasn't had a bad outing in a while, allowing no more than three runs in any of his last six starts and in just two of his 16 total appearances this season. He's unlikely to get lit up by a righty-heavy Giants lineup Tuesday.
I'm only going to recommend two pitchers here, in part because it feels strange to recommend a full half of the slate and in part because I'm pretty disinterested in most of the available options. Won Tae Choi ($7,000) looks like good value as the second-cheapest arm on the day, however. Most of his appeal comes from the fact that he's the ninth-ranked Tigers lineup, but he's decent enough to be usable at this price even against a stronger lineup. His fantasy appeal is capped by his below-average 14.2 percent strikeout rate, but he's been successful for several years without generating many whiffs, as his 3.79 ERA marks the third time in four seasons that he's been below 4.00 in that category. He's allowed exactly one run in each of his last two starts and could make that three in a row against the toothless Tigers.
Top Targets
Baek Ho Kang ($6,300) is always a very popular choice, and he's likely to be as popular as ever with fewer options to choose from Tuesday, but if you don't go with the crowd, you may simply be left behind. The 22-year-old is having a remarkable season at the plate, hitting .400 as recently as last week, and his on-base percentage still sits at a ludicrous .499 even after a rare three-game hitless streak last week. There's little reason to believe he'll slow down Tuesday, as he'll get the platoon advantage against Giants righty Yeong Hwan Choi, whose 2.56 ERA this season comes with a 5.73 career mark and a 19:16 K:BB.
Sung Bum Na ($5,900) has been on a tear on both sides of the Olympic break and may be the Dino to grab if you select just one, as he'll get the platoon advantage against 19-year-old Twins righty Min Ho Lee and his 5.19 ERA. Na had a merely good .838 OPS through July 2, a figure which would have represented his weakest mark since his rookie season back in 2013, but he's been on fire since then. He's homered seven times and driven in 15 runs over his last 14 games, slashing .340/.390/.792. The veteran slugger is doing everything he can to lead the Dinos back to the postseason after the team lost four everyday players for the season due health-protocol violations.
Bargain Bats
Sticking with the Dinos, Jeong Won Choi ($2,900) has established himself as the team's number two hitter following those aforementioned suspensions and remains a very good value as long as he continues hitting there. Almost anyone would be interesting at a price this cheap if they got to hit directly in front of the likes of Na and Eui Ji Yang, but the 21-year-old second baseman has shown enough to be interesting in his own right. He doesn't come with a ton of pedigree, as he was a seventh-round pick back in 2019, but he's hit a very respectable 299/.378/.379 in 102 plate appearances across the last two seasons while adding an impressive nine steals.
Justin Bour ($2,000) continues to struggle at the start of his time in Korea, but he remains a steal at his minimum price. There's no defending his .091/.211/.182 slash line and 36.8 percent strikeout rate through his first nine games, but we're of course interested in what he'll be going forward, not what he was yesterday. His track record is far stronger than most foreign hitters in Korea, appearing in 559 MLB games and posting a 114 wRC+ at that level. He also shouldn't be facing serious troubles adapting to life overseas considering that he spent last year with the Hanshin Tigers in Japan. Steamer projects that he'd have a very respectable .729 OPS if he returned to the majors today, so nine bad games aren't nearly enough to indicate that he deserves to be a minimum-price option at the KBO level.
Stacks to Consider
Heroes vs. Hyeon Su Kim: Hye Seong Kim ($5,600), Dong Won Park ($5,100), Yong Kyu Lee ($3,200)
The short slate means I'll write up just one stack here, though stacking the Wiz, Twins or Dinos seems like a fine idea to me as well. Hyeon Su Kim may have thrown 5.2 scoreless innings in his most recent start, but that came against the last-ranked Eagles lineup and came with a 2:3 K:BB, so it's hard to call it a convincing performance. Even after that outing, he owns a 6.35 ERA and 1.81 WHIP in 22.2 innings, numbers that look well-deserved given his 12.8 percent strikeout rate and 13.8 percent walk rate. There's little reason to believe a dramatic improvement is coming any time soon, as Kim was merely a third-round pick back in 2019 and was even worse in 32.1 innings as a swingman last year, struggling to a 7.24 ERA and 2.23 WHIP while striking out 19 and walking 31.
Jung Hoo Lee is out with a side injury and Will Craig has mysteriously disappeared from DraftKings' player pool, but we still have enough options to choose from to make a compelling Heroes stack. Hye Seong Kim is one of the fastest players in Korea, ranking second with 30 steals. That speed, along with his .378 on-base percentage, has helped him score 62 runs, the fifth-best mark in the league. Park is the best use of your catcher slot Tuesday if you want to avoid the crowd that inevitably forms around Eui Ji Yang. He ranks second to Yang at the catcher position in homers (17), runs (40) and RBI (53). Lee has benefited from his role as the Heroes' leadoff man, a spot he deserves thanks to his .391 on-base percentage, as his 53 runs tie him for 12th. That total is just seven fewer than he managed in 35 more games last season while setting the table for a very poor Eagles lineup.
