Manager Larry Sutton left the Lotte Giants after failing to complete his term due to health problems. If you look at the past, in the case of the Lotte baseball team, there are quite a few managers who quit midway.
It was like that from the first command tower. Manager Park Young-gil commanded the Lotte club when the professional baseball was launched (1982), but after finishing 5th in the first year (6 teams at the time), it was hardened after staying in 4th place in the first season in 1983. Looking at the ‘drop-out’ only, Kim Jin-young (1990), Woo Yong-deuk (2002), and Yang Sang-moon (2019) took off their clothes without being able to fill a single season after the command tower contract. Manager Seong Ki-young (1987) and manager Lee Jong-woon (2015) laid down the baton after one season.
Lotte, a first-year professional team, has had 17 coaches (excluding acting coaches), but the average tenure is only 2.47 years. There are only four commanders (Kang Byeong-cheol, Kim Yong-hee, Jerry Royster, and Jo Won-woo) who have commanded Lotte for three consecutive seasons. The commander who led the giant corps for the longest consecutive time was coach Kim Yong-hee (4 years and 7 months, November 1993 to June 1998). Of course, he also withdrew due to poor performance during the 1998 season. Manager Kang Byeong-cheol, who led Lotte to its first and last Korean Series championships in 1984 and 1992, won three championships (January 1984-November 1986, November 1990-October 1993, October 2005-November 2007 ) or served as the Lotte command tower. He was with Lotte for about 8 seasons. Excluding the tenure of manager Kang Byeong-cheol, the average tenure of the Lotte command tower is only about two seasons.
The late coach Kim Myeong-seong, who led Lotte to its last Korean series entry in 1999, died of a heart attack while returning from fishing on a break in July 2001. Looking at the most recent one, the only Lotte manager who has properly filled the contract period is Royster. After coach Royster, coach Yang Seung-ho led the team for two seasons, but was sacked due to irregularities in the academy entrance exam, and coach Kim Si-jin left the team after two years due to poor grades. Acting manager Lee Jong-woon, who is currently leading Lotte in place of manager Sutton, only filled one year out of the three-year contract period as manager, and in the case of coach Cho Won-woo, he signed a three-year extension for his contribution to completing the two-year contract period and putting the team in the postseason. However, due to poor grades, he resigned after a year.안전놀이터
Director Yang Sang-moon, who led Lotte from October 2003 to October 2005 and discovered Lee Dae-ho (retired) and others, made a comeback as Lotte command tower in October 2018, but took off his clothes after half a season. Afterwards, general manager Seong Min-gyu took office and recruited manager Heo Mun-hoe, but manager Heo was also sacked in May 2021, his second season. Coach Sutton, who took over after Huh, also said he would resign voluntarily, but failed to fill his term. It is said that if Lotte’s performance had been good, other results might have come out.
Lotte is playing the rest of the season as acting head coach Lee Jong-woon, and talk about the next head coach is already flowing. Mainly Lotte players and coaches are on the rise.