On The Rise As A Catcher [EN]: Chapter 23

It was a signal to focus solely on the mitt.

The batter was a rookie who had just joined the pros.

A greenhorn, still wet behind the ears.

No need to overthink it.

He had already easily handled the previous batters.

‘Fastball. High inside fastball.’

Taisuke’s fastball was fast and heavy.

The catcher judged that his narrow stance and low hitting position meant he was anticipating a forkball.

It’s necessary to intimidate batters looking for a breaking ball with an inside pitch.

‘Got it.’

Taisuke was confident in his pitches.

Control was the issue, but his velocity and the bite on his pitches were already recognized.

His control was improving as he worked with Hiroto Coach to correct his pitching form.

“Hoo.”

Taisuke raised his knee to his chest.

Seeing this, Hiroto Coach frowned.

It was his old form.

A pitcher can increase his velocity by raising his leg kick high, but it makes control difficult.

Hiroto Coach helped Taisuke improve his control by lowering his leg kick and hand position.

Before the correction, Taisuke was an extremely overhand pitcher.

The ball he threw with an overhand motion easily exceeded 150 km/h [approximately 93 mph].

Add to that a falling forkball, and batters were helpless.

If he had only had control, he would have been a lock as the team’s closer right away.

Taisuke throwing the ball with his old form meant he intended to overpower Song Seok-hyeon with his velocity, without worrying about control.

“Ha!”

Taisuke gritted his teeth and threw the ball.

The ball came right down the middle instead of inside.

It was a mistake pitch, but it looked to be easily over 145 km/h [approximately 90 mph]. Too much for a high schooler who hadn’t even lost his baby fat.

Thwack!

Song Seok-hyeon swung without hesitation.

He kept his elbow in and extended his wrist and bat to nearly 180 degrees.

“Wow……”

Ryosuke, who was playing left field, couldn’t even think about chasing the ball that looked like a dot far away.

The ball went far over Ryosuke’s head and over the fence.

It kept going and going beyond the fence.

People couldn’t even see where the ball landed.

Song Seok-hyeon calmly put down his bat and ran.

“……”

There was no cheering.

No fuss.

The Hero Magic and Okinawa Bear players stared at the fence as if possessed.

An out-of-the-park home run.

Taisuke stared blankly at Song Seok-hyeon rounding second base.

Successive hits as a catcher.

Bases loaded with no outs.

“Hey! What was that just now?”

“Amazing!”

Kim Jeong-ryul and Kim In-hwan were shouting and making a fuss as Song Seok-hyeon returned to the bench.

Other Japanese players applauded with dumbfounded expressions.

“The pitch was completely grooved [a pitch thrown right down the middle of the plate].”

Song Seok-hyeon gave an awkward smile.

“Even if it was grooved, still. Out of the park, out of the park. It went over there!”

“Hey, what out of the park? There aren’t even many rows in the stands.”

“The problem is that it went way over those stands.”

“It’s just because it was grooved. The ball was fast, so the rebound was better.”

“You son of a gun, you’re more amazing than I thought? A young kid already hitting the ball that far?”

“I just got lucky, lucky.”

“What luck? How many guys can hit it that far even if they try? Isn’t that right, In-hwan?”

“Yes, that’s right. It’s not something that can be done just with strength.”

“Wow, how did a guy like you come in as a walk-on? Are the scouts these days blind?”

While Song Seok-hyeon, Kim Jeong-ryul, and Kim In-hwan were making a racket, Taisuke kicked the mound with his foot.

His mind went blank when he saw the ball soaring far over the fence.

He just gave up a home run, an out-of-the-park home run, to a mere twenty-year-old?

His stomach was churning.

“Pitcher! Pitcher! Let’s go!”

The umpire called out to Taisuke, who was in a daze.

Only then did Taisuke come to his senses and receive the ball.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

A straight walk [walking a batter by throwing four balls outside the strike zone].

Taisuke’s pitches were scattered everywhere without a consistent landing point.

The Hero Magic manager grabbed a ball and came up to the mound.

“Should we change him at this point?”

Taisuke looked at the ball in his hand and then at the Okinawa Bear bench.

Song Seok-hyeon with a faint smile, and Kim Jeong-ryul and Kim In-hwan bursting into laughter.

Taisuke gripped the ball tightly.

“Could you give me a little more chance?”

“You want to throw more? Didn’t you say you were just warming up lightly today?”

“I want to throw more. Please, Manager.”

Taisuke slightly lowered his head.

The Hero Magic manager put his hands behind his back.

One second, two seconds, and then ten seconds.

After a moment of contemplation, the manager nodded.

“Okay. Since it’s come to this, throw as much as you want and come out. You want to go up against that kid one more time, right?”

“……I want to have a proper match. I was too careless just now. No, I was arrogant. A closer shouldn’t throw a single pitch carelessly.”

“A pitcher needs that kind of competitive spirit. Go ahead. Get your revenge this time.”

Taisuke smiled.

“Thank you, Manager.”

The manager left the mound.

Taisuke pressed down on the mound with his foot and adjusted his cap.

“Okay, let’s do this.”

* * *

-Strike! Out!

-Strike! Out!

-Strike! Out!

Once Taisuke returned to his original pitching form, the batters couldn’t handle him.

Their bats were pushed back by just the fastball, and they couldn’t even graze the forkball.

Kim Jeong-ryul came up to pitch in the next inning.

The first pitch was a fastball with a two-seam grip [a grip on the baseball that causes it to sink].

The batter was out on a ground ball on the first pitch.

“Oh, it really drops more with this?”

Kim Jeong-ryul caught two batters in five pitches and finished the inning.

Kim Jeong-ryul was beaming as soon as he returned to the bench.

“Hey, it’s amazing. The angle got better just by changing the grip.”

Kim In-hwan said.

“Are you going to convert to underhand?”

“Should I? Haha, breaking balls are so easy to throw underhand. The velocity is a bit low, but it doesn’t hurt anywhere.”

“I think your sinker is really good. It’s better than most underhand pitchers. Try throwing it when you pitch overhand later. If the sinker works, you’ll have more patterns than you do now.”

“I tried everything when I threw overhand. I didn’t get this kind of angle back then. Well, if you could get this kind of angle throwing overhand, who would throw underhand? Everyone would throw overhand.”

“Still, it would be good to try it.”

“Is that so?”

Taisuke came up to the mound.

“He’s coming up again. Wasn’t he a relief pitcher?”

“I wonder. Isn’t he going down? Is he having a pride battle with his senior or something?”

“Hey, no way. And I’m done this inning.”

“Why isn’t he going down? Is he practicing eating innings [pitching multiple innings to save the bullpen] or something?”

“Didn’t they say they were going to develop him as a professional closer?”

“I heard that.”

Song Seok-hyeon watched Taisuke silently.

Taisuke’s pitching form was more subdued and clean than when he faced Song Seok-hyeon.

It was completely different from the form he used to throw with an overhand motion.

“Does he originally have two forms……”

Three minutes.

That was the time it took for Taisuke to face three batters.

Fly out, strikeout, strikeout.

As soon as the batter entered the plate, he threw the ball right away without giving them a chance to breathe.

The next pitcher for the Okinawa Bears came out in the next inning.

He was a short, chubby sidearm pitcher.

Thwack!

Thwack!

Thwack!

Thwack!

“Oh my. It’s a mess, it’s a mess.”

Kim Jeong-ryul covered his face with both hands.

The Hero Magic batters sat back and teed off on the pitcher’s pitches.

The pitcher’s fastball velocity was around 130 km/h [approximately 81 mph].

The only breaking ball was a slider.

The problem was that the velocity itself wasn’t fast, so the bland fastball and slider weren’t threatening to the batters at all.

“We might get reversed [lose the lead].”

No sooner had Song Seok-hyeon finished speaking than Ryosuke stepped up to the plate.

One out, runners on first and third. The situation where the most plays come out.

There were no separate plays from Hero Magic.

The Okinawa Bear manager went up to the mound and changed the pitcher.

The changed pitcher was a tall left-handed pitcher.

The pitcher threw the ball in succession as practice pitches.

“He has a good ball?”

A fastball thrown down from a high release point.

Song Seok-hyeon didn’t hold back his praise.

“If we took someone like that to Korea, they’d be all over him, calling him a promising left-hander.”

“Even if these guys are at the level of industrial league baseball [a semi-professional baseball league], it’s not easy.”

“Even though there are deviations and ups and downs for each kid, there are no easy guys.”

“I can’t easily attack that pitcher’s fastball?”

“I need to get used to the ball a bit. The velocity is decent. It looks like it’s coming in at about 142 km/h [approximately 88 mph].”

The practice pitches were over.

Ryosuke walked to the plate.

He was a slugger, but his stance wasn’t that wide.

He lightly swung his bat and looked at the pitcher with a blank expression.

Whoosh!

The pitcher threw the first pitch.

Ryosuke’s eyes sharpened.

An outside fastball.

The safest and most common choice for the first pitch.

Ryosuke slightly lifted and extended his front leg at the slightly missing fastball.

Clack!

The ball caught the end of the bat.

Ryosuke kept his armpits in and pushed his top hand straight out.

The ball went over the first baseman’s head.

The ball flew precariously over the foul line.

Thud!

The ball didn’t go out into foul territory and fell on the line.

The runners ran, and the batter-runner reached second base.

A sweeping double.

Ryosuke took off his protective gear with an indifferent expression and handed it to the coach.

“Wow.”

Kim In-hwan shook his head.

“Unbelievable.”

“I agree. He has good bat control.”

“He’s in the minor leagues? Wow, he’d be on the first team right away if he came to Goht [likely a Korean baseball team].”

“I thought it was going to be foul.”

“Usually, the last swing is pulled, but he consciously pushes it. If a slugger has that much control, pitchers will have a headache.”

The pitcher’s face was already drenched in sweat.

Reversal.

Both the pitcher and the batter know that the word is to aim for the first pitch from the changed pitcher.

The changed pitcher is bound to carefully choose the first pitch.