A Rookie In The Baseball Team Is Too Good [EN]: Chapter 171

Chapter 44: Scavenging the Baseball Field (5)

“Jang-ho, just a minute! Let me throw three more curveballs! My shoulder isn’t fully warmed up yet!”

“Understood, Coach!”

As Ryu Jang-ho adjusted his helmet and took a step back, Ji-seop had returned to the Canons’ dugout.

“Hoo.”

A slight tension.

Ji-seop let out a short sigh.

Standing next to him, Director Seo Chang-gi patted his shoulder and spoke.

“It’s been quite a while… Our manager seems to still have faith in Special Advisor Kim.”

“Pardon?”

“Or is it not so?”

Director Seo continued.

“The manager, who usually wants to observe leisurely, readily changed his mind at your word, didn’t he? You can tell just by that.”

“Oh, you’re saying that again.”

Ji-seop wore an embarrassed expression.

“Manager Freeman probably knows the front office’s position as well. That a new ‘hit product’ needs to emerge soon.”

“Hehe, field staff pretend not to know all that. Breaking their stubbornness is never easy.”

In Director Seo’s experience, communication between the front office and field staff was always discordant.

But since Ji-seop took on the role of special advisor, that difficult task was running smoothly, as if lubricated with high-quality oil.

As Director Seo Chang-gi, who had worked in the front office for a long time, he couldn’t help but feel reassured by Ji-seop’s presence.

“Anyway… What did Coach Jang say, Special Advisor Kim?”

Director Seo Chang-gi had been looking at Ji-seop with an admiring expression.

As if suddenly remembering, he mentioned the Canons’ outfield defense coach.

“For today’s test, Coach Jang must have set a passing grade of his own, right?”

“Yes, if he faces a total of 20 batted balls and accurately predicts the direction of 5 of them… he said he would give Kyung Sun-woo the authority to freely adjust his defensive position in the future.”

“Wait a minute, what? Five?”

Director Seo tilted his head.

“Isn’t that standard too low? That means he passes with only a 25% success rate.”

“I said the same thing, and Coach Jang said…”

Ji-seop smiled, imitating the outfield defense coach’s tone. “Reality is different from computer games.”

“He said that when starting-level outfielders predict the direction of batted balls, their success rate is less than 10%.”

“10%, you say?”

Director Seo was taken aback by the lower-than-expected figure but soon began to nod slowly.

“Hmm, that makes sense. It’s not often that an outfielder catches a ball almost in place. It’s only three or four times in a game, at most, isn’t it?”

“Yes, Coach Jang said that even a success rate in the high teens would mean tremendous defense. If data analysis is added to the player’s natural sense, there will be a great synergy effect.”

Ji-seop continued.

“But this is batting practice, not a real game, and the pitch is announced in advance. So, it’s appropriate to raise the passing grade to around 25%.”

“Ah, so that’s the conclusion you came to?”

As Director Seo stroked his chin and turned his gaze toward the field, he heard the sound of a bat hitting a ball.

The bullpen coach, who had finished preparing, threw the first ball, and Ryu Jang-ho hit it, creating a large fly ball.

“Mine! Mine!”

The ball, drawing a large arc toward the right-center field, landed in the glove of Kyung Sun-woo, who was waiting in advance.

A faint smile appeared on Director Seo Chang-gi’s face.

“Even if he catches only 5 out of 20, he’ll easily pass… If it’s such a difficult mission, I’ll have to watch with my eyes wide open.”

*Thwack!*

Watching another ball fly in a long arc, Director Seo continued.

“Even for Kyung Sun-woo, scenes like catching the ball in place like that don’t happen often… Hmm?”

It was at this moment that a strange expression appeared on Director Seo’s face.

Ryu Jang-ho’s second batted ball flew exactly to where Kyung Sun-woo was standing.

*Thwack!*

The third ball too.

*Thwack!*

The fourth ball too.

Kyung Sun-woo was waiting a step ahead and catching the ball in a very relaxed posture.

“Sp, Special Advisor Kim?”

Director Seo Chang-gi’s eyes widened.

“How many is that now? How many has he caught in place so far?”

“Four, Director.”

Ji-seop, who was now unfazed by most things, had a subtle excitement in his voice at this moment.

“Kyung Sun-woo, if he catches just one more… he passes the test.”

* * *

Kyung Sun-woo was showing off his ability to predict batted balls in front of his teammates and coaching staff.

To put it bluntly, Kyung Sun-woo plunged all the members of the Canons into ‘shock and horror’ that day.

‘??!!’

Of course, it wasn’t perfect.

After succeeding the first four times, he failed to properly predict the direction of several subsequent balls.

Once, he completely misjudged, allowing a hit.

He even had to run frantically after a ball rolling to the fence.

“Damn it, I really hate… *huff huff*, hating sweating like this!”

Even as he stuck out his tongue and breathed heavily, Kyung Sun-woo meticulously checked the changing wind direction.

“…Alright!”

From the moment he stood up again and pounded his glove with his fist, making a ‘bang bang’ sound.

And from the moment he shouted at Ryu Jang-ho in the batter’s box, ‘Please take care of me, senior!!’ in a voice that seemed to come from the depths of his stomach.

Yes, that was exactly the highlight of the test that day.

*Thwack!*

*Thwaaaack!*

Ryu Jang-ho’s practice balls were flying deep into the outfield.

The intense batted balls, boasting the best speed among the Canons’ hitters.

The KH Canons’ new right fielder began to catch them without much difficulty.

*Thwack!*

He lightly caught a ball that would have completely split the right-center field by simply extending his arm.

*Thwack!*

He caught a ball that would have barely fallen on the first base line with a stroll-like gait.

*Thwaaaack!*

Later, he even jumped up from his spot to retrieve a ball that seemed to hit the top of the fence.

“…….”

It was perhaps natural that silence fell on the KH Canons’ field when Ryu Jang-ho’s batting practice ended.

‘Wh, what did I just see?!’

‘He’s catching those like that?’

He accurately predicted the direction of 12 out of 20 batted balls.

Considering the three balls that Ryu Jang-ho sent over the fence, Kyung Sun-woo’s success rate that day was a whopping 70%.

Ji-seop felt the hairs on his body stand on end at the result, which far exceeded expectations.

‘Kyung Sun-woo, that guy… he’s the real deal.’

Ji-seop’s mind was quite complicated at this time.

He was happy to see the emergence of a player who could be called a true ‘genius’.

He also regretted that he could have found Kyung Sun-woo sooner if he had visited the minor league games more often.

He also resented Kyung Sun-woo’s high school coach, who had advised him to hide such tremendous talent.

But only for a moment, Ji-seop began to do what he had to do.

“Kyung Sun-woo! Kyung Sun-woo!”

First, he gestured wildly to call Kyung Sun-woo, who was in the outfield, to the dugout.

“Ah, yes!!!”

While Kyung Sun-woo was rushing over after receiving the instruction, Ji-seop examined the reactions of the Canons’ coaching staff.

“Manager, coaches, what did you think?”

“Ah, Special Advisor Kim.”

The Canons’ coaching staff gathered around Ji-seop one by one.

But no one easily opened their mouths.

The tremendous performance shown by the rookie who had just been promoted to the first team.

It seemed that even the experienced coaching staff needed time to recover from the shock.

“No, at this level…”

“It’s not a matter of what or how…”

Heo, hoo, can this be happening.

The coaching staff only uttered strange exclamations and couldn’t easily say anything concrete.

Kyung Sun-woo, who had returned to the front of the dugout, tilted his head, wondering, ‘Why is the atmosphere like this?’

“Coach.”

A calm voice came from where Ji-seop didn’t expect.

“Coach?”

“Oh, yeah. Jang-ho.”

The owner of the voice was Ryu Jang-ho.

The guy who had just finished batting practice was approaching the outfield defense coach.

After lightly bowing to the other coaches around him, the Canons’ best hitter opened his mouth with a serious expression.

“Did you see Sun-woo just now?”

“Yeah, yeah. I saw it. I was watching.”

“…What should we do?”

As always, Ryu Jang-ho was only saying what was necessary.

He didn’t even mention that he was really great or surprised.

He seemed to think that he knew enough about Kyung Sun-woo’s talent, so all he had to do was find a way to use it.

“His ability to judge batted balls seems to be much better than mine. I’m thinking of letting Sun-woo decide the defensive position of the right fielder himself from now on… Coach, would that be okay?”

Ryu Jang-ho was the center fielder, the core of the Canons’ outfield defense.

Since such a player declared that he was ‘better than me,’ the outfield defense coach didn’t have much to say.

“Yeah, let’s go that way once.”

The outfield defense coach said.

“But Sun-woo doesn’t have much experience in the first team yet, so Jang-ho, you should support him well from the side.”

“Understood, Coach.”

Ryu Jang-ho seemed to be moving toward the locker room after slightly bowing to the outfield defense coach.

“…….”

However, was it because of the outfield defense coach’s instruction to ‘support him well from the side’?

Or was it because he felt sorry for thinking of his junior player as an ‘insincere guy’ and ignoring him?

Ryu Jang-ho spoke to Kyung Sun-woo, who was standing in front of the dugout.

“Hey, Kyung Sun-woo.”

“Ah, yes, Se, Senior!”

It seemed that the story that Ryu Jang-ho was known as the ‘devil’ among the young players was true.

Just by calling his name, Kyung Sun-woo’s face turned pale.

Of course, Ryu Jang-ho didn’t seem to care much about Kyung Sun-woo’s attitude.

“Don’t you remember what I told you in Florida? I told you that you can say anything about baseball.”

Ryu Jang-ho frowned slightly.

“If you had told me in advance, I wouldn’t have misunderstood. Special Advisor Ji-seop wouldn’t have needed to prepare this test either.”

Ryu Jang-ho seemed to have a vague idea of who had planned the ‘test’ that day.

Kyung Sun-woo scratched the back of his head and bowed his head at the words of his senior, who was like the sky [a figure of immense respect].

“I’m sorry, Senior.”

A voice that was barely audible.

“I, I remembered what you said, Senior, but there’s something confusing about it.”

“Confusing? What?”

“It’s hard to tell what’s a question about baseball and what’s not a question about baseball.”

Kyung Sun-woo looked at his senior’s face.

“There are more than one or two things that are ambiguous, and I can’t ask you about them one by one when you’re busy…”

“Hey, why is that difficult? Baseball is baseball, and if it’s not… Hoo.”

No, never mind.

Ryu Jang-ho seemed to be too lazy to argue about every little thing, so he just waved his hand.

“Forget what I said. Just ask. I’ll answer anything you ask… But let’s not let this happen again in the future. Got it?”

Then, Ryu Jang-ho patted Kyung Sun-woo’s shoulder and left.

Ji-seop, who was watching this situation from one step behind, was smiling inwardly.

‘If this happens… I don’t have to worry too much about the relationship between the two in the future.’

He thought this was enough.

In the first place, Ryu Jang-ho was like a solitary lion.

He didn’t like hanging out with people, and he didn’t bother to make friends.

If such a guy said that he ‘can ask anything,’ it meant that he had opened his heart to Kyung Sun-woo a little.

He was just thinking that he should watch the two of them work together harmoniously, but-

“Really?”

Right then, Kyung Sun-woo called out to Ryu Jang-ho, who was taking a drink from the refrigerator.

“Can I really ask you anything? Is that right, Senior?”

“Ah, I said so, didn’t I?”

Ryu Jang-ho was a little annoyed.

“Ask, ask! Why do you make me say the same thing over and over again?”

“Then, Senior, there’s something I’ve been so, so curious about since before.”

Kyung Sun-woo carefully approached, slowly looking at Ryu Jang-ho’s face.

“When I asked other people, they kept saying they didn’t know.”

“What is it?”

Ryu Jang-ho looked down at his junior player while gulping down a drink.

And the next moment, a question that no one expected popped out of Kyung Sun-woo’s mouth.

“Last time’s physical test… Why did you fail, Senior?”

“Ptooey!!!”

At the sudden question, Ryu Jang-ho spat out the drink he was drinking on the floor.

“Wh, what did you say?!”

Ryu Jang-ho stared blankly at his junior, not even thinking of wiping the drink flowing from his mouth.

Kyung Sun-woo handed Ryu Jang-ho a towel but didn’t stop asking questions.

“No, it’s strange, isn’t it? The Ryu Jang-ho I know is always sincere about baseball… It’s hard to believe that such a person had difficulty in a mere physical test.”

“…….”

“I thought, ‘Professionals are not easy. Unexpected slumps can come. So, it would be good to know in advance and prepare for it.’…”

Ryu Jang-ho asked with a dumbfounded expression after hearing Kyung Sun-woo’s question.

“Is that really why you’re asking?”

“Yes.”

“It’s not because I haven’t accepted your greetings all this time…”

“Oh, Senior! I’m not such a petty person!”

Then, he even slapped Ryu Jang-ho’s arm.

“…….”

Was it difficult to handle his nonchalance?

Ryu Jang-ho looked at Ji-seop with eyes that seemed to say, ‘Please save me.’

But Ji-seop just smiled at him.