The Korean men's volleyball team still saved face.

South Korea beat Indonesia 3-2 (29-27, 19-25, 25-19, 21-25, 15-8) in the 7th and 8th place match at the Hangzhou Asian Games on the 26th.

The Korean national team urgently transfused veteran setter Han (38, Korean Air) and left for Hangzhou, saying, "I will bring the Asian Games gold medal for the first time in 17 years since the 2006 Doha Games."

However, he was eliminated from the medal competition even before the opening ceremony, and eventually finished the tournament with a "no medal" after 61 years.

Hwang Taek-eui (27, Sangmu) is the best player who shows what the Korean men's volleyball problem is.

It's not just because Hwang Taek-eui can't even push out Han, who is 11 years older than him.

This is because Hwang Taek-eui is a representative example of "how Korean volleyball officials evaluate players."

If the view of Hwang Taek-eui as a "good setter" does not change, Korean men's volleyball will never be possible.

Hwang Taek-eui wore the KB Insurance uniform as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2016-2017 rookie draft when he was a second grader at Sungkyunkwan University.

Hwang Taek-ui was the first setter to receive the first overall nomination.

Hwang Taek-eui, who won the Rookie of the Year award in his debut season, made his senior national team debut through the Fédération Internationale de Volleyball Association (FIVB) World League International Men's Volleyball Championship in 2017.

If you look at it up to this point, you can say that you have taken a typical 'elite course.

His team, KB Insurance, also treated Hwang Taek-eui as an elite.

KB Insurance signed an annual contract with Hwang Taek-ui for an annual salary of 730 million won ahead of the opening of the 2020-2021 season.

Hwang Taek-eui became a professional volleyball "salary king" by beating Hwang Taek-eui, who is said to be the best setter in Korea then and now.

Even though he was a setter who had never led the team to "spring volleyball" in four seasons since his professional debut.

In response, there were rumors in the volleyball world that KB Insurance had signed a contract in advance with Hwang Taek-ui, who was a year away from qualifying as a free agent.

In fact, KB Insurance made the postseason stage for the first time in 10 years in the 2020-2021 season, but Hwang Taek-eui's salary, the main setter, did not rise by even 1 won from 730 million won.

The fact that KB Insurance has set up such a "protection barrier" with its annual salary ahead of acquiring FA qualifications means that it saves Hwang Taek-ui that much, and at the same time, there was a separate club aiming for him.

In fact, whenever I received an offer to give Hwang Taek-ui to your team, KB Insurance shouted "No Saeng-Q."

Hwang Taek-eui is said to be an "elite setter" because he is "a good athlete."

Hwang Taek-eui is tall (189cm) for a setter and has a good serve enough to serve as a one-point server from his debut season.

In addition, according to the Asian Games profile, Hwang Taek-eui has a 10cm better blocking height (310cm) than Han (300cm) who is the same height.

Based on this athletic ability, it also shows an amazing set (toss) as shown in last year's Suncheon-Dodram Cup professional volleyball tournament.

But if I am good at sports, do I have to be a good player?

In fact, just as catchers do in baseball, setters in volleyball are close to talking about team performance.

Hwang Taek-eui led the team to the spring volleyball stage only twice during his seven seasons on the professional stage, in the 2020-2021 season (3rd place) and the 2021-2022 season (2nd place).

During these two seasons, Hwang Taek-ui flew 52.4% of the entire set to 'Malley Express' Keita (22, now Verona).

At this time, volleyball fans think of the two words, "Molbang (沒放)."

Of course, the setter who is good at setting up a small room is also a good setter.

It means he's a setter who knows how to fly the ball well to the team's main striker.

However, isn't it a better setter not only for the players who are good at it but also for the players who increase the team's offense overall?

When the records left by KB Insurance players last season when Hwang Taek-eui spiked the floating ball, the attack efficiency is 0.349.

This is the 9th place among the 14 players (=7 teams × 2 players) who had the most sets in professional volleyball last season.

Since our debut season, 10th place - 6th place - 6th place - 9th place - 1st place - 9th place, so it's not that bad last season.

Can a player whose record only goes up when he plays with a good striker be called a good setter?

Hwang Taek-ui's record is low because he has a hard time distributing the ball when his reception is shaken.

Hwang was 3.4th on average when his fellow player correctly received his opponent's serve, ranking 5th - 2nd - 1st - 7th - 4th - 4th.

When the receiving falters, the ranking drops to an average of 7.3 places (9th - 9th - 8th - 10th - 4th - 1st - 10th). 파친코

Don't you usually call a setter a good setter who floats the ball to make it easier for a fellow player to score even if the reception is shaky?

Hwang Taek-eui was a good setter only when Keita was there, a player who could solve even if his setting was shaky.

Also, generally, a setter that opens the opponent's blocking wall well is considered a good setter.

The International Volleyball Federation (FIVB) divides the case where the ball is floated to a place with no opponent blocker or one person into a "running set" and the case where the ball is floated to a place with two or more players into a "steel set."

Hwang recorded a 30.4% running set percentage from his professional debut until last season.

This is the 9th place among the 14 players with the most cumulative sets since Hwang Taek-eui made his professional debut.

During the same period, Han (39.0 percent) ranked first in this category. Kim Myung-kwan (26, Hyundai Capital) came in second with 35.3%, and Yoo Kwang-woo (38, Korean Air) came in third with 34.9%.

Conversely, Kim Hyung-jin (28, Korean Air) and Lee Ho-gun (27, Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance) were tied for the bottom with 23.1%, followed by Hwang Dong-il (37), who retired after playing in all seven men's teams with 27.7%.

This is, of course, not to say that this record is an absolute criterion for the evaluation of setters.

But when you say you're going to form a team with three setters, would you choose Han, Kim Myung-kwan, and Yoo Kwang-woo? Or would you choose Hyungjin Kim, Hogun Lee, and Dongil Hwang? Hwang recorded a running set rate of 29.5% last season.

Shin Seung-hoon (23), who had the second-largest set in KB Insurance, had a higher running set ratio at 31.2%.

In addition, when Shin Seung-hoon hit a floating ball, the offensive efficiency left by KB Insurance players was 0.376.

In case anyone forgot, Hwang Taek-eui had this record of 0.349. But that doesn't mean that Shin Seung-hoon is a better setter than Hwang Taek-eui.

I'm just telling you that the record is different even if you play with the same teammate in the same team.

However, if these records are accumulated and accumulated to make a difference, Shin Seung-hoon may become a better setter someday.

There is not a good setter or a bad setter in the world, but a setter who plays like a good setter is a good setter. Nikola Jokic (28, Denver) won the MVP of the NBA championship last season.

Jokic is considered one of the representative players in the NBA who has "no athletic ability".

If you look up how much Jokic can jump in Sargent (in place) on Google, you'll see a (humorous) post saying, "It doesn't reach 5 inches (about 12.7 centimeters)."

Jokic is not only lacking in jumping skills, but it's really slow even if it's slow. That's how much of a scene is in the highlight film.

If you're an NBA player, it's not strange if you come out with an "in-your-face (dunk that hits the opponent's face)" in this situation. Jokic is also well aware that he lacks athletic ability to play in the NBA.

Jokic, who is from Serbia, said, "The players here (NBA) are really too fast and really too high. I know I can't do that anyway, so I decided to just play basketball."

The "Saver Metrics Revolution," which shook the U.S. Major League Baseball in the 2000s, also started at this point.

A good player, whether his body shape is not like a model, his feet are too slow to look at, or whatever is different from other good players, he leaves a similar record to any other good player. Of course, a good setter is a good setter in volleyball, which leaves a similar record to a good setter.

And if the proposition is true, then the treatment against is always true, so a bad setter doesn't leave a record similar to a good setter.

Then why should Hwang Taek-eui, who has never left a record similar to a good setter except when he was with Keita, be rated as a good setter?

Hwang Taek-eui failed to leave a similar performance as a good setter at this year's Asian Volleyball Federation (AVC) Challenger Championship (3rd) and Asian Men's Volleyball Championship (5th).

Is it a normal demand for a player who has never performed well in both professional and international competitions to succeed in the Asian Games, which is actually the biggest stage that the Korean men's volleyball team can experience?

Just as nothing has changed since KB Insurance nominated Hwang Taek-eui, the Korean men's volleyball team, which believed in Hwang Taek-eui, was destined to fail at the Asian Games before bringing in Keita.

In short, Korean volleyball, at least men's volleyball, still cannot distinguish between "being good at sports" and "being good at playing." It's not strange because I don't know exactly what 'being good at playing'.

Peter Drucker (1909-2005), a guru of business administration, said, "You can't measure it, you can't manage it," but he doesn't know how to measure Korean volleyball properly. If not, I wouldn't be pampering a player who has only failed without a "special" foreign player like this.