CHANGWON, South Korea, - KT Wiz starter Ko Young-pyo celebrated his son's first birthday Thursday the only way a baseball pitcher can: with a victory on the mound.

Ko tossed six shutout innings to help the Wiz past the NC Dinos 3-0 in Game 3 of the second round in the Korea Baseball Organization (KBO) postseason. This was the Wiz's first win of this series after losing the two previous games. They can send the series back home in Suwon, just south of Seoul, with another win in Game 4 on Friday.

Ko, who gave up only three singles, lived up to his billing as an extreme groundball pitcher. With Ko's deadly mix of changeups and fastballs, worms on the field at Changwon NC Park stood no chance on this night.

Of the 18 outs Ko recorded, 10 came via groundouts, against three flyouts. Ko struck out five batters while walking two.

Ko set the tone of the game by striking out the first two batters he faced, with Son Ah-seop and Park Min-woo both fanning on changeups.

Ko pitched around a one-out walk in the second and then a two-out single in the third.

After giving up a leadoff single in the fifth, Ko got a fielder's choice grounder for the first out. He then induced Kim Hyung-jun -- who turned 24 on Thursday -- to an inning-ending, 5-4-3 double play.

The Dinos shot themselves in the foot against Ko in the sixth.

Kim Ju-won began the proceedings with a single but was caught trying to steal second. Son struck out swinging for the second time in the game. After Park Min-woo drew a walk, Park Kun-woo fanned on a changeup -- the final out by Ko.

Ko threw 105 pitches -- 47 changeups, 44 fastballs, 13 curveballs and one slider. His fastball only touched 138 kilometers per hour, but the Dinos hitters still had trouble with their timing on those pitches because of Ko's changeups

This was Ko's first start since his last regular season outing on Oct. 3. Over the past month or so, Ko said he had to get himself ready mentally as well as physically.

"I tried to rest as much as I could and not do anything special," Ko said. "When you're not doing much, you're bound to start overthinking things. Whenever that happened to me, I held myself back because I didn't want to do too much on the mound. I concentrated on getting enough rest and on things I could do to make life miserable for hitters."

Inducing groundballs is something Ko does better than almost any pitcher in the KBO. He also rarely walks anyone, with only 19 free passes handed out in 174 2/3 innings this regular season. Ko walked two batters Thursday, which is a good total for most pitchers but an uncharacteristically wild day for Ko.

"I didn't want to give NC hitters much to hit because I felt they had been swinging the bats really well," Ko said. "My approach was different today than in the regular season. Instead of just pitching to contact, I tried to exploit hitters' weaknesses. That led to a high pitch count and a couple of walks."

Ko's son, Cha-min, was born on Nov. 2, 2022. Ko and the Wiz were out of the postseason by then, and Ko was there for the birth of his first child.

But a year later, the 32-year-old father had a rather urgent piece of business: saving the Wiz's season after the team dropped the first two games of the best-of-five postseason battle against the Dinos.

Cha-min is too young to understand what his father does for a living. But once he grows older and learns of his father's accomplishment on the day he turned one, Cha-min will feel very proud -- and also understand why his dad couldn't be around for the celebration.

The happy father said his son was "an extremely positive influence" on his outing.

"I think I was so blessed today," Ko said. "I tried to focus extra hard and pitch as well as I could for him."

Source: Yonhap News Agency