There is no such bad luck. With the main players suffering from numerous injuries, another player got injured in the Doosan Bears, who have settled at the bottom.

The Doosan Bears excluded foreign batter Jake Cave and backup catcher Jang Seung-hyun from the first team roster on March 31, when there were no games.

Attention was drawn to the exclusion of Cave from the first team, who has been responsible for the central batting lineup since the opening. A Doosan official noted, 'This is due to exclusion from the first team due to symptoms of fatigue. He is expected to return in ten days.'

Cave signed with Doosan as a new foreign batter for an aggregate deal of $1 million (about 1.4 billion won) last November, experiencing KBO league play with a batting average of .240 (6 hits in 25 at-bats), 1 RBI, 3 walks, a slugging percentage of .320, and an on-base percentage of .321 over 9 exhibition games. Although the results were not satisfactory, expectations were high ahead of the regular season given his status as a current big leaguer with over 500 major league games played.

However, Cave also could not escape the variable of 'adaptation.' Contrary to expectations, he struggled in the opening series against the SSG Landers, remaining hitless for two consecutive games. After going 0-for-4 with 1 walk and 2 strikeouts in the opening game, he followed it up with another 0-for-4 and 2 strikeouts the next day, accumulating 4 strikeouts in 9 plate appearances while recording 8 at-bats.

Cave sparkled with a rebound, including back-to-back multi-hit games during a three-game series against the Suwon KT Wiz starting March 25, hitting 5 hits in 11 at-bats with a batting average of .455 over three days. However, his bat cooled again during a weekend series against the Samsung Lions in Jamsil, where he went 1-for-9 with a batting average of .111, leading to fluctuations as he finished the season's first 8 games with a batting average of .214, 3 RBIs, and no home runs due to suffering from fatigue that led to ten days of enforced rest.

The occurrence of injuries early in the season for Doosan is not new. Doosan, which prided itself on completing the first and second spring camps without major injuries, faced significant setbacks right before the opening of the 2025 season, with native ace Kwak Bin suffering an internal oblique strain, and relief pitcher Hong Geon-hee injuring his elbow, both leaving the team. To make matters worse, after finishing the opening series, left-handed relief pitcher Lee Byung-heon also showed symptoms of gastroenteritis and was excluded from the first team. Relief pitchers Choi Ji-gang and stolen base king Jo Soo-hyung are also currently in the second team.

Losing three key relief pitchers, Doosan has only managed to achieve 2 wins (6 losses) in 8 games since the season started. They are at the bottom, lower than the Kiwoom Heroes and NC Dinos, who were initially classified as lower-tier teams. With the backup players collapsing one after another in the relief role and the batting lineup struggling with ineffective performance, Doosan experienced the pain of consecutive losing series last week. They are also tied for last place with only 2 home runs and ranked 8th in team batting average at .223, indicating a poor offensive performance.

Doosan has painful memories of enduring injuries last year while operating a Plan B throughout the season. Unlike this year, last year saw many foreign starting pitchers, such as Raul Alcantara, Brandon Waddell, and Shirakawa Keisho, suffering from numerous injuries, leading to controversies over bullpen overworking. Despite the adverse conditions, they managed to finish the regular season in 4th place but experienced a disaster where they lost both games in the wildcard playoff to the 5th-place team, marking a first in KBO league history.

So when will the injured players join the first team? For now, it seems that Kwak Bin and Hong Geon-hee will take some time. With re-examinations scheduled for early April, specific rehabilitation schedules and return dates are expected to be announced after that. Lee Byung-heon, recovering from gastroenteritis, is expected to be registered for the weekend series against the Lotte Giants, while Choi Ji-gang and Jo Soo-hyung might join as early as next week. Manager Lee Seung-yup noted, 'It's a difficult situation, but what's left is for the players to return.'

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