Peaceful Bullpen Life [EN]: Chapter 61

※ 61. Backup

In comics or animations, characters with exceptional control are often depicted with exaggerated feats:

“Wow, 9-split control!” “Wow, 16-split control!” Wow!

But in reality, such a thing doesn’t exist.

I can say that definitively. It’s only possible in cartoons. If someone could actually do that, they should be in a circus sideshow, not playing baseball.

Realistically, players considered to have good control possess pinpoint accuracy on the top, bottom, left, and right corners of the strike zone.

With further improvement, they can throw the ball in and out of the zone at will.

The pinnacle of control is the ability to make slight adjustments within those pinpoint locations.

I, who proudly topped the survey asking 100 professional baseball players, ‘Who is the pitcher with the best control in the KBO [Korean Baseball Organization]?’, am at about that level.

In the 10 years since my debut, I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve hit a batter with a beanball.

Firstly, because my control is good. Secondly, because hitting someone means giving them a free base, so I’d rather let them get a hit and increase my chances of getting them out.

I’m a professional. I have to win. No matter how much animosity I have towards an opponent, there’s no reason to hit them on purpose.

And even if I didn’t hit them on purpose, it’s still my mistake. I heard that in the Majors [Major League Baseball in the US], they don’t apologize out of pride, but this is Korea.

I felt sorry for Lee Yong-ho, but my initial reaction was disappointment.

Why did I keep throwing that fastball that was constantly missing? Why did I give up a free base after creating a good count?

It was a human moment, so it couldn’t be helped. As my disappointment faded and I reached for my hat to apologize, I heard,

“Hey, aren’t you going to apologize to your senior? You son of a bitch, hey!”

That crossed the line.

Lee Yong-ho threw down his bat and stormed towards me, spewing sudden profanity.

Uproar!

A bench-clearing brawl naturally erupted.

The umpire immediately stepped forward, blocking Lee Yong-ho, and Gyuhak stood beside the umpire.

All the players from both dugouts rushed out, but once they were out, they seemed unsure why they had come.

“Come on, it wasn’t intentional. Let’s keep it reasonable.”

“No, X! Look at that bastard! Hey, hey you! Are you kidding me?!”

The umpire tried to calm him down, but he didn’t seem to hear, continuing to yell and point at me. At this point, our guys were starting to get pissed off.

“What about me?”

“What about me? Hey, what did you just say?”

“Didn’t I hit you on purpose?”

“Hit me on purpose? Son of a bitch, are you kidding me?!”

“Hey, hey, calm down.”

“Just apologize and end it.”

“Hyung [older brother or respected male figure], hyung, stop it.”

Seonghoon-hyung, who was closest to me, patted me and tried to calm me down.

Even Gyujin-hyung, who had more animosity towards Lee Yong-ho than anyone else, tried to stop me, and the other younger players started to hold me back.

“You son of a bitch, is that how you talk to a senior?!”

Oh, I’m getting pissed.

“No, X. Let me go.”

I was trying to handle this peacefully, but what?

I pushed away those who were holding me back and approached Lee Yong-ho.

“Did I hit you on purpose? I’m asking if I hit you on purpose!”

“Whether it was on purpose or not, you should apologize!”

“You have to give me time to apologize! What am I supposed to say when you start swearing as soon as you get hit?”

“You’re talking back to your senior?”

“Senior? Senior? Senior, you say? Do you even act like one?”

“What?!”

“When are you going to get rid of that superiority complex? What benefit do I get from hitting my senior?”

“X, you to me…….”

“What about your senior?”

“You…….”

“What? Say it.”

From the conversation up to this point, I vaguely gathered that he was well aware of the terrible things he had been doing.

“A senior has to act like a senior.”

As the situation calmed down somewhat, my true feelings unconsciously slipped out. I didn’t think he was worth dealing with, so I went back to the mound.

Worried about what would happen next, the umpire came to the front of home plate before the next pitch and pointed to both dugouts.

Warning.

If another ambiguous situation arose after this, there would be an ejection party.

Then the opposing team’s manager stepped up to protest, but it was already Lee Yong-ho’s karma.

Only then did he realize what he had done, and Lee Yong-ho’s face, still seething with anger, turned blue.

He’s going to get a serious scolding.

That’s that, but from my perspective, the current situation was a doubled crisis.

I was already annoyed that I had reduced a three-run lead to two, and now I had given up a free runner.

Sigh.

I shook it off with a breath and refocused on Gyuhak.

Let’s do what I can.

What I had told Junhyuk before I came up to pitch. I just had to do that.

“Strike!”

I started by throwing a deep inside strike to Lee Kyungjun.

“Swing, swing!”

And then I added a changeup that felt very far away and looked incredibly slow.

I fiddled with the ball, thinking about the next pitch. Sinker? Splitter? I didn’t really feel like either of those.

Curveball.

It was definitely the pitch I had given up a home run on today, but strangely, my mind was drawn to the curveball.

If I get hit here, it’s a two-run homer, and we’ll be tied. As I thought that, my index finger was touching the brim of my cap.

I glanced at the runner and went into the set position. Gyuhak was squatting on the outside, holding his mitt, but I focused on my right knee instead. Right in the middle of the zone.

Thwack!

The high-hanging ball momentarily made me pause, but then I forcibly pulled the slowly dropping ball.

The slow ball, forced to be pulled, was fast, but it could never go in a good direction.

“Second! Right away!”

Seongmoon caught it head-on and tossed it to second base. The runner on first was Lee Yong-ho, and I suddenly thought of Myungjin’s bad throw from the past.

“Plenty of time, take it easy!”

I shouted unconsciously. In response, Myungjin didn’t jump up but quickly moved to the side and prepared to throw to first.

“Out!”

As I said, an easy double play.

Yeah!

Woohoo!

As befitting a team with a good atmosphere, all sorts of cheers filled the air as I headed to the dugout.

I high-fived Myungjin and Seongmoon. As soon as I returned to the bullpen, Gyuhak, who had followed me, asked,

“Hyung, was that a mistake just now?”

“What? The curveball?”

“Yes. It came right down the middle, didn’t it?”

“No, I did it on purpose.”

“Huh? Why?”

“Just wanted to get a double play.”

“Isn’t a sinker better for that?”

“But my heart was calling for a curveball.”

“But the middle is a bit…….”

“My curveball isn’t that fast, you know. Big angle.”

“That’s true.”

“So, if I aim for the corners, the bat won’t come out.”

“But Jung Seonghoon…….”

“I wanted to strike him out, but he hit it well. Nothing I can do.”

I shrugged and went over to where Senior Shin Kyungseok was warming up.

“Senior, sorry. Gave up a run.”

“Hanwool can treat us.”

“Ah, okay. I’ll treat.”

“Yay.”

What a cheerful person.

I chuckled and sat down on a chair, watching the sidearm pitcher’s form. How does he throw like that?

“Ah, nice ball!”

With those incomprehensible movements, Senior Shin Kyungseok struck out all three batters and finished the game cleanly.

After the game, I got a text from Woosuk.

[Got it for you.]

Seongwoon had won another victory against Visco. That way, we were able to stand on the same line as Visco again.

Tied for 3rd place.

Now it’s time to stay in this spot without going down.

I replied with, “Possible tomorrow too?” and started the car. As I was about to shift into D, a reply arrived, so I took out my phone again.

[Totally possible.]

My friend’s reply was a very satisfying line.

* * *

Let’s divide the power of a professional baseball team into four categories.

From a defensive perspective, there are pitchers and fielders, and from an offensive perspective, there are hitters and runners. I see these four as having a ratio of 30, 20, 40, and 10, respectively.

Here, what we need to pay attention to is the pitcher’s 30. Let’s divide this again into the proportion of starting pitchers and relief pitchers. In the old days, when relief pitchers were looked down upon, the ratio was 25 for starting pitchers and 5 for relief pitchers. No, 5? I don’t think it was even 5.

But with the era of the great bullpen opening, it’s 20 for starting pitchers and 10 for relief pitchers. Some talked about half and half, 15 to 15, and there were even those who saw the importance of the bullpen as even greater.

My heart is at 15 to 15.

I guess it’s because my team has had a terrible bullpen as a tradition for over 10 years.

Now, let’s apply this 15 to 15 ratio to the ‘current’ One Challenger. Starting pitchers are 12 out of 15 points. Relief pitchers are 8 out of 15 points.

Hyung Gyujin was already showing signs of coming back to life, and Hyukjoon was also finding his pace.

Do what you used to do.

It was worth explaining in detail what could be summarized in five words.

A crow-tit should do what a crow-tit used to do. It’s possible that it won’t just end with its legs being torn.

Hyukjoon, who was still on the younger side, seems to have realized that only now.

Junhyuk, who has a similar name, too. It’s funny that his problem was being easily swayed. It’s a different reason from Hyukjoon, but in the end, the words I gave him were the same.

Do what you used to do.

He’s not showing the overwhelming performance he did at the beginning of the season, but he’s still doing his part to some extent.

Taewoong, the 4th starter, well… I really like that he’s consistent.

There are four players in the bullpen. Including me, who is in the middle, Senior Choi Eungu, Senior Shin Kyungseok, and rookie Jiho.

The two seniors have completely established their original forms, and Jiho is finding his own color.

Let’s not look into the rest.

From the beginning of the season, the team balance was a mess.

If one part was good, another part would break down, and if we fixed that, another part would break. And as we passed August, the team balance started to come together little by little.

August’s record, 20 wins and 7 losses. An overwhelming team win rate of 74%.

Based on this, we broke through Visco’s ceiling, which seemed impossible to break through, and secured 3rd place in the league, and we are trying to maintain this level.

The method of aiming higher is more important, but with only about a month left in the season, Dongseong, who should be right above us, is nowhere to be seen.

I was satisfied with the fact that the gap between us and Seongwoon, who had overtaken Visco and taken 4th place, was four games.

Satisfaction.

What part was I satisfied with?

Pinch hitter [a batter substituted late in the game for strategic advantage], Park Byeongcheon

Pinch hitter, Kim Dohoon

Pinch hitter, Park Heonhee

The courage to send all three hitters in as pinch hitters with backup members in the top of the 9th inning, narrowly winning by one point.

“Let’s go, let’s go!”

“Ah, good bat, good bat!!”

“Eeeey!”

The end of last year’s season was just a time of forgetting fatigue with joy and anticipation.

I had simply ignored the accumulated impact on my body with the anticipation of reaching the post-season for the first time in 6 years, or for the first time since my debut.

In the end, it just ended with going ‘to’ the post-season team. There’s a magic phrase to shout in times like this.

This year is different.

It’s good to have this much leeway. It’s good for the team players’ stamina management, but,

Tap―

Tock!

Ttaack―!

“Aaaargh!! Heonhee! Our Honey!! You honey pot-like bastard!!”

Competition.

There are 30 spots on the post-season roster.

Four starters, four relief pitchers, nine in the batting order, Daejuja Gibum [a player known for their speed, often used as a pinch runner], and Juho, who will focus on the role of pinch hitter rather than defensive replacement.

Excluding these 19, none of the remaining 11 spots have been decided yet.

Infinite competition!

When a team that has only played in the bottom ranks for years gets close to the post-season for two consecutive years, it produces these additional effects.

“Yeeeah! Senior, is it sweet?!”

The backup members know better than anyone else. The main members of the first team are useful, but the 1.5th team level, the semi-regular spots, are still unclaimed.

I high-fived Heonhee, who had hit a two-run home run and returned to the dugout.

The concentration of players with injected purpose was extraordinary. Even if we made a lineup with 1.5th team level members based on our standards, there were many cases where we won with spirit.

Expectation.

There are more parts that we can expect this year than last year, when only the local parts were certain.

“Ah, Jiho is doing well, doing well!”

“Thank you!”

Jiho perfectly finished the game by cleanly blocking the bottom of the 9th with three batters.

Little by little, little by little. The balance that had been off since the beginning of the season began to come together. In preparation for the final stage of the post-season.