An honorable death?

Okay, so I didn't see the final game, but everyone is talking about what an idiot the Korea team coach was to not have walked Suzuki Ichiro when the game was tied 3-3 with two men on toward the end of the game.

Iheartblueballs, the commenter with the NSFW avatar, said it as eloquently as anyone can:

That was easily the single dumbest move in the history of baseball to pitch to Ichiro. He’s one of the top 5 hitters on the planet, and with the game on the line and an open base…just plain ridiculous to even give him a chance.

The ESPN guys couldn’t believe how stupid it was either. They called the result before it even happened.

A shame for the Korean players to fight so hard for the last few weeks, battle back in the 9th to tie it, and then get shit on by an absolute dumbfuck move by their manager.

None of the assistant coaches had the balls to tell him what was plain to anyone with half a brain cell?

I didn't watch the game, but I can imagine what was at work here. I'm guessing that Coach Kim Inshik (김인식) saw two options for victory: one where he goes up against the insolent Ichiro like true warriors on the battlefield, or the other where he weasels his way out of a confrontation and moves on to an easier opponent.

Simply put, who would want a victory through the lesser latter option? No, t'would be better to lose in a true battle — these are athletes after all! — than to win by weaselly means. And if defeat is the result, it is still an honorable one.

Shinsano comes to a similar conclusion: "In the mind of Kim In-shik to walk the reviled Ichiro was to lose face," he says.

But I don't agree that it was bad nationalism; instead, I think it was good theater. Imagine if he had won: there would be praise for this gutsy move that somehow paid off. In loss, he can still say he went head-to-head instead of weaseling out.

Now imagine he had done a weasel-walk and had won. For the next four years, that would be the cry from Team Korea's naysayers: You only won because you weaseled away from Ichiro. Worse, had he done a weasel-walk and lost, then there would be considerably less honor in the defeat that did come. At least this way he can hold his head up.

That is, if the news reports are not true that he is saying he told the pitcher to walk Ichiro. Because that just shoots my whole Honorable Warrior Theory* straight to hell.

Maybe Shinsano and iheartblueballs are right: All boneheaded nationalistic bravado, no brains.

UPDATE: The Marmot's Hole has an entire post dedicated to this.

* The Honorable Warrior Theory is also the Reckless Bus Driver With Something to Prove Theory.