Will Park Joon-young (27) be able to minimize the vacancy of Heo Kyung-min, a "franchise star".

The Bears have parted ways with Huh Kyung-min, who has been with Doosan for 16 years in the Stove League. Rejecting options worth 2 billion won (approx. 2 billion won) for three years with Doosan, he signed a four-year contract (down payment of 1.6 billion won, annual salary of 1.8 billion won, option of 600 million won).안전놀이터

Huh Kyung-min's transfer hurt Doosan fans so much. In July, he said in front of his home fans, "Don't worry too much, I'll be here forever." Doosan fans believed Heo Kyung-min, the symbol of the club, would stay, but he declared an opt-out and broke up with Doosan.

Now, Doosan needs to find a substitute to take charge of its defense on the third base instead of Huh. This is not an easy task. Huh was a key third baseman when Doosan won the Korean Series for seven consecutive years from the 2015-2021 season. He displayed outstanding defense capabilities, as evidenced by his stellar defense capabilities, as he won the KBO third baseman's defense award last season.

Heo should be succeeded by Park Joon-young. Park Jun-young wore the NC Dinos uniform as the first pick in the 2016 rookie draft. A pitcher at the time of joining, he has been a batter since September 2017 due to an elbow injury.

Park Joon-young, who took over as an infielder after transforming into a batter, showed remarkable slugging capability. Since he started playing in the NC Dinosaurs' first division in earnest from the 2021 season, he hit eight home runs. The problem was accuracy. From the 2020 to 2022 seasons, Park never hit .300 (0.152-0.209-0.216).

After failing to grow as expected in NC, he moved to Doosan ahead of the 2023 season. Doosan named Park Joon-young as a reward player after Park Se-hyuk signed an FA contract with the NC Dinos for a four-year total of 4.6 billion won. Making his debut for Doosan in the 2023 season, he started the season in the second half due to an injury. Park's final performance in the 2023 season was .228 with four home runs, 17 RBIs, and an OPS of 0.707 in 51 games.

Since his performance in the 2023 season was not bad, he was likely to become the main shortstop ahead of the 2024 season, but he exposed his limits. In the 2024 season, Park Joon-young hit a batting average of 0.226 with seven home runs, 28 RBIs, and an OPS of 0.727. He posted a slugging percentage of more than 0.4, and hit seven home runs, but he still couldn't escape his batting average in the early 20% range.

Park Joon-young's performance in the 2025 season is important, although he is still unable to break the egg. If Park Joon-young minimizes Heo Kyung-min's gap, Doosan can go beyond the wild card game. Attention is focusing on whether Park Joon-young will be able to fill Heo Kyung-min's vacancy.