Tigers defeat Twins to open KBO postseason series

By Yoo Jee-ho

GWANGJU, Oct. 17 (Yonhap) -- Slugger Kim Do-yeong homered twice and drove in four runs, while starter James Naile tossed seven innings of one-run ball, as the Kia Tigers rallied past the LG Twins 5-1 to begin their South Korean baseball postseason series at home Saturday.

Kim smacked a solo home run in the bottom of the fourth inning to break a 1-1 tie and then drove in an insurance run with a sacrifice fly in the sixth at Gwangju-Kia Champions Field in Gwangju, some 270 kilometers south of Seoul. Kim then put an exclamation mark with a two-run home run in the eighth inning.

Naile held the Twins to a run on four hits over seven effective innings in front of a sellout crowd of 18,000.

Game 2 is 2 p.m. Sunday at the same Gwangju stadium.

In the past 10 editions of the best-of-five first round, teams that claimed the first game went on to win the series nine times.