The Pitcher Just Hits Home Runs Well [EN]: Chapter 253

253. There’s No Second Mariners in My Dictionary (1)

Through James Corporation, I requested answers to three simple questions from major league teams.

First, an assessment of my current skills, divided into pitching and batting, with a request for a comprehensive evaluation of both.

Second, the team’s short- and long-term vision. And third, an explanation of why that team believed it was the best fit for me.

In truth, the request was simple, but I considered it quite audacious. Nevertheless, a whopping 28 out of 30 teams responded.

Moreover, the answers were more detailed than I anticipated.

Ted Park, who had returned to the United States with me, handed over a surprisingly thick stack of documents, considering the brevity of my questions.

“We disregarded the Marlins and Athletics from the start. All the other teams sent documents. It’s a little disappointing that we didn’t get all 30, but it’s still one more than Shohei Ohtani’s case. You can be a little proud, you know?”

“Nah. It’s nothing to boast about. Ohtani has already proven what’s possible. This is just a chance to buy a player on the cheap, isn’t it?”

“No, I don’t think it’s just about the price. These guys have been in baseball their whole lives; they must have an eye for talent, right? Last year’s overall number one pick, Rafael Rodriguez, was highly touted as the best prospect in the nation, but he’s only just finished rookie league and is playing in Single-A [the lowest level of minor league baseball]. Alexander McDowell, the overall number one pick from two years ago and this year’s Rookie of the Year and a strong MVP contender, tore up AA [Double-A minor league] in his first year, but compared to Swan dominating the KBO [Korean Baseball Organization], the phrase ‘tear up’ is a bit of an understatement. I think even if we started at $200 million, at least three or four teams would have jumped in.”

It was intended as a light joke, but Ted’s reaction was quite intense. He seemed to realize it himself and immediately apologized.

“Ah, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. Is something stressing you out lately?”

“No, it’s nothing.”

Ted initially denied it, but his denial didn’t last long. When I heard the details, it wasn’t a big deal, but I couldn’t help but laugh. Some of the 28 teams that approached me internally downplayed my KBO records and were skeptical about the two-way player aspect, suggesting there were better options.

“Hey, why get stressed out about something like that?”

“No!! No matter how you view the level of the KBO, even if it’s Single-A instead of AA, if someone dominates it that much, they should be considered MLB-ready [Major League Baseball-ready]. The logic itself doesn’t make sense, does it?”

“Conservative people might think that way.”

“No. Even the most conservative old-timers wouldn’t say that. Besides, Shohei Ohtani has already proven the value of being a two-way player, so why be skeptical? Moreover, there are already seven teams in the majors using two-way players.”

Indeed, since the announcement of the new roster policy in 2021, Major League teams had been working hard to utilize two-way players. The reason was simple: on a 25-man roster, the number of pitchers that can be registered is 13, but in the case of a two-way player, they can be an additional person outside of those 13.

That’s how the game is.

Rules change to fit the situation, but those changed rules create new situations.

Baseball is a very old game.

But as a great hitter once said, we know surprisingly little about the game we’ve played our whole lives.

The first pitcher specialization, called La Russa-ism—which at the time was evaluated as ‘unnecessarily appearing in the 9th inning of games that were already won and getting paid a lot of money for it,’ or in short, ‘1-inning closer’—was introduced in professional baseball in 1988, a whopping 100 years after it first started in 1876.

Since then, baseball has changed very quickly. The average roster of 11 pitchers and 14 fielders became 12 pitchers and 13 fielders, and eventually, the number of pitchers increased so rapidly that a roster of 13 pitchers and 12 fielders became more common.

In fact, the reason the Major League roster increased from 25 to 26 was largely due to the fact that with 13 pitchers being commonly used, there were only 3 backup fielders besides the backup catcher.

In other words, the multi-position players that are popular in Major League Baseball these days are ultimately a result of the increased proportion of pitchers on the roster.

And that’s why two-way players were a very important alternative.

Thanks to Shohei Ohtani’s outstanding performance, the term ‘two-way player’ has become associated with playing both as a starter and a designated hitter, but in reality, most existing two-way players serve as both relief pitchers and backup fielders. It’s a kind of expanded version of an infielder utility player.

Of course, in the long term—that is, in the mid-2030s, when children who grew up watching Shohei Ohtani’s performance begin to enter the professional ranks and establish themselves—the story will be a little different. But predicting the future is never easy.

And the more someone has played baseball their whole life, the more they are controlled by their habits, and the more likely they are to completely misunderstand the essence of it. Just like how the 1-inning closer was initially treated as someone who unnecessarily appeared in the 9th inning of games that were already won when La Russa-ism first started.

In conclusion, even in the front office, which deals with numbers, there is still debate about the usefulness of two-way players. The atmosphere in the field, which overwhelms the front office in terms of conservatism, was even more serious.

“Shohei Ohtani? That’s just because he’s Superman. I don’t believe that another Superman can exist at the same time.”

“But isn’t Swan a little different? You were also impressed by his batting form.”

“Ah, of course, Swan is great. But look at Ohtani. He was a complete pitcher who also had great talent as a hitter. On the other hand, Swan’s completeness as a pitcher? Well, I don’t think he’s a major league-level pitcher. Wouldn’t it be more helpful to focus on his hitting and unleash his full potential as a hitter rather than awkwardly pitching as a 5th starter or long reliever?”

This is a story that came out of the Seattle Mariners, and for reference, the offer they made to me also stated that they fully supported the two-way player aspect and would provide all the support equivalent to what the LA Angels gave Shohei Ohtani. I think it was an offer they threw out there knowing the atmosphere within their team.

Of course, even if the Seattle Mariners didn’t have that kind of atmosphere, they weren’t a team I was considering in the first place.

Trying to turn a perpetually losing team into a winner was enough with the Korean Mariners. Just looking at the LA Angels around 2020, they had two players who were not only MVP-level but also worthy of the Hall of Fame and among the top 20 players of all time, yet they couldn’t even make it to the postseason.

And the Seattle Mariners are a team similar to the Korean Mariners.

Of course, the Seattle Mariners weren’t the team that hadn’t won a championship for the longest time in Major League Baseball. Even if you don’t go as far as the Chicago Cubs’ 108-year record or the Boston Red Sox’s 86-year record, which have already been broken, there’s Cleveland’s real-time 90-year record, the Texas Rangers, who haven’t won since their founding in 1961, and the Milwaukee Brewers and San Diego Padres, who also haven’t won since their founding in 1969. The Seattle Mariners, founded in 1977, 8 years later, were relatively better off when it came to winning.

But what makes the Seattle Mariners special is that while other teams have at least ‘challenged’ for the championship but unfortunately failed, the Seattle Mariners have never even made it to the World Series, which can be said to be a ‘chance to challenge’ for the championship since their founding.

Experiencing such a team was enough with the Busan Mariners.

Anyway, James Corporation has been checking and filtering out places where the offers from teams are slightly different from the actual atmosphere of the team. This would have been unnecessary if I were just a regular free agent.

But I had to sign for a contract of less than $5 million and the minimum salary. Compared to players who spend $200 or $300 million, there might be teams that just throw money at it and don’t utilize it properly, so this was a necessary task.

Ah, of course, I was also very deeply involved in the process of selecting teams. I am a man who knows the ‘future,’ after all. I already know which team will win and which players will do well, so wouldn’t it be easy to choose the team that is most suitable for me?

‘That’s what I thought back then.’

I regret it.

I underestimated the ‘butterfly effect’ too much. Honestly, the only thing that changed in history was me playing in ‘Korea,’ so I thought, how much could it have changed in the United States on the other side of the world?

“Wait a minute. Aaron Liz of the Texas Rangers sent a love call? Is that the Aaron Liz I know?”

“Yes, that’s the ‘future of Texas,’ Aaron Liz.”

What surprised me here was not that Aaron Liz was the MVP of the American League or that Aaron Liz sent me a love call.

The part that surprised me was that he was a player belonging to the Texas Rangers. In the original history, Aaron Liz was a franchise star of Cincinnati and had never won an MVP, but he was still a top-class ‘third baseman’ who was consistently selected as an All-Star. And the current Aaron Liz was playing as a ‘shortstop’ who debuted with the Texas Rangers last year.

The changes from the history I originally knew didn’t end there. Already three years have passed since I returned to this era. And during those three years, the butterfly effect created by me playing baseball across the Pacific was truly enormous.

Unlike the KBO, where trades are rare, MLB trades are very active, and even trades involving minor league players or opt-out waivers are more active. By changing a few players, the team’s ranking changes, the draft order changes, and the trades change again, creating an incredibly complex chain effect.

As a result, the situation in Major League Baseball ahead of the 2028 season was very different from the Major League Baseball I remembered. Since I only played in the majors from the 2034 season in my previous life, I only remembered the 28th season in a very rough way, which made it even more difficult.

In the end, the plan to go to the most suitable team with the cheat key of knowing the future was scrapped before it even started, and it was decided to primarily entrust the experts with using my knowledge of the future as a reference for choosing a team.

And during that time, I devoted myself purely to building my body.

Sometimes there are people who don’t understand that it’s difficult to gain weight, but it’s ultimately a matter of constitution. Why not? It’s harder to maintain a dieted body than to diet. The same goes for building muscle. It’s hard to build muscle, but it’s even harder to maintain a body that I’ve forced myself to create by overeating when I already have a natural eating habit.

Many people understand that bodybuilders’ bodies shrink when they retire simply because they stop taking drugs, but if you think about the fact that maintaining their bodies also requires consistently eating 5 or 6 meals a day, you can see that it’s not just a matter of drugs.

Anyway, with the help of Jack, the younger brother of the Washington brothers, and Sundar, the physical instructor he introduced, I was able to build my body very smoothly.

Before the start of last season, my weight was 92kg. And when the season ended, my weight was 88kg. And now.

220lb

100kg in kg.

I finally escaped from being a skinny guy.

“Choi Su-won, to sum it up, we have selected five teams as the final candidates.”

Half of the 28 teams were eliminated in the document screening.

Seven more teams were eliminated with a slightly more thorough analysis.

And two more teams were eliminated due to changes in the team’s circumstances in the meantime.

So, the names of a total of five teams were placed in front of me.