Doosan spent its last series scoring in waves against Samsung, while Lotte spent its last series struggling to score at all. Their meeting asks whether Lotte can stop a small leak before it becomes a long inning. In the other matchup, KIA's late answers against LG run into a Samsung side that nearly erased a Doosan lead but could not finish the comeback. Those recent series frame two different questions; they do not decide either upcoming game.
In the provisional records, Doosan scored in six separate innings during its latest win over Samsung, after collecting 20 hits in the previous meeting. Lotte scored only twice across its three recorded games at KT. KIA put three runs on the board in the ninth inning in each of its last two games against LG; Samsung scored four in the seventh against Doosan in its latest game but still lost. The first scoring chance in each matchup may tell us more than the latest final scores.
