The Pitcher Just Hits Home Runs Well [EN]: Chapter 327

327. Maybe a Fluke? (8)

[The star of a 57-game hitting streak!! Achieves the 25th perfect game in Major League history simultaneously!!]

[Don Larsen, David Wells, David Cone, Domingo Germán. And Choi Su-won!! The fifth perfect pitcher born in the Yankees!!]

[Choi Su-won!! Achieves the 25th perfect game in Major League history!!]

[Anthony Volpe’s ‘The Grap’!! Protects Choi Su-won’s perfect game!!]

[A great record after 4 years and 362 days since Domingo Germán!!]

[Choi Su-won Throws a whopping 137 pitches!! Records the most pitches in perfect game history!!]

[Record broken after 86 years and 343 days!! Choi Su-won records a 57-game hitting streak with a home run!!]

[Choi Su-won ‘Today was like God pushing me to set a great record.’]

Waking up in the morning, the stiffness throughout my body was beyond imagination. My shoulder especially hurt, which wasn’t surprising considering I threw a whopping 137 pitches yesterday.

Goodness.

137 pitches.

Honestly, even a manager who’s known as a ‘human butcher’ these days wouldn’t let someone throw 137 pitches. Moreover, I’m still at an age where my body isn’t fully developed. The team’s guideline itself was set at 85 pitches.

“I probably would have been taken off the mound for sure in the 7th inning if it had only been a no-hitter.”

I don’t remember the exact wording because I was so out of it, but I think manager Jeff Clark said something like that in yesterday’s interview.

Oh, and he also said something like this.

“I plan to have him thoroughly examined and let him rest for at least two days. His rotation will also be skipped once. Fortunately, the All-Star Game is in the middle, so he can get about two weeks of sufficient rest for his shoulder.”

At the time, I wanted to argue, ‘How can I rest for two days when I need to play every game to meet the required at-bats?’ But waking up this morning, I think I did well not to argue back then.

After a short stretch, I opened my smartphone and saw a tremendous amount of messages piled up.

From my father to relatives I barely remember, and countless seniors, juniors, and peers from my school days. Colleagues from my Mariners days and players I knew from the KBO [Korean Baseball Organization]. The most heartfelt messages were usually from people in the broadcasting industry, and most of them were asking for a phone interview.

If I were a rookie experiencing this for the first time, I would have replied to each one, felt uneasy about those I couldn’t reply to, and so on. But this is now too familiar to me.

There’s no need to feel particularly uneasy if I don’t reply to these.

I posted a thank-you message on social media and forwarded the messages from broadcasting officials to my manager.

Real close friends understand this much.

If they don’t know how busy a baseball player is during the season, they’re not really close to me. And my father will take care of the relatives anyway.

I dragged my stiff body to the massage room prepared in the hotel.

Of course, it wasn’t the hotel’s spa staff giving the massage. Nathan Liu, a Chinese-American massage therapist and doctor hired by the team, was waiting for me.

He’s the successor to a traditional Chinese medicine clinic that has been in New York’s Chinatown for three generations. At just 27 years old, he has qualifications as an orthopedist in New York State, as well as various alternative medicine certifications such as acupuncture and chiropractic. In fact, his massages are the best I’ve ever received.

“Yesterday’s game was amazing, wasn’t it?”

“Did you watch it?”

“Of course. Live!! Why else would I be doing this job for so little money?”

“You get paid a lot. I heard you get paid more than the coaches?”

“Hmph, it’s still a meager salary. If I go back home and take over my family’s hospital, I can rake in money.”

“But you hate traditional Chinese medicine, don’t you?”

“······. Anyway, as I always say, the reason I work here is because I want to contribute to the Yankees winning the championship. And I want to take a sabbatical year watching the Yankees’ games, not because of the money.”

His fingers pressed a little harder.

“Ah!!!”

“Bear it!! No, I mean, other people throw like 70 or 80 pitches when they get a perfect game. Why did you have to throw 137 pitches so recklessly? I saw in the article yesterday that the next most pitches thrown in a perfect game was only 125. And even then, you only got 11 strikeouts.”

“11 strikeouts in 9 innings is good enough, isn’t it?”

“Matt Cain, who threw 125 pitches, had 14 strikeouts. Most of the other people who got 11 strikeouts were around 110 pitches.”

I honestly had nothing to say to his story.

This perfect game of mine was more like a gift from heaven than skill.

“Anyway, after Domingo’s massage after the game, I’ll have some time. Make sure you get a massage too. Don’t work out to loosen up your body. Especially, don’t throw any balls for the time being.”

“I was planning on it even if you didn’t say so.”

The morning passed quickly with the massage.

Baseball is an everyday sport. Yesterday’s great record is yesterday’s great record, and today is today’s game.

The third game of the series between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox.

Since I was given a day off today anyway, I got off the bus with the intention of giving fans some service before the game and signed a lot of autographs.

“Swan!! Swan!!! Over here!! Over here!!”

So, this is Boston.

The team that Boston supports is the Boston Red Sox. And Boston, famous as the New York Yankees’ rival team.

But surprisingly, the child holding a baseball in one hand and the child’s parents, who are calling my name so eagerly, are wearing jerseys with the words RED SOX written in large red letters on the chest. No, it wasn’t just that child. Quite a few young Red Sox fans were holding out baseballs to me, asking for autographs.

The reporters who followed from New York were taking pictures like crazy, as if the scene would go down in history. Well, to be honest, I thought it was a scene that would go down in history.

Anyway, signing with my left hand naturally made my signature a bit of a mess. But what can I do? In the world of collectors, something different like this is more popular.

A signed ball from Choi Su-won, who recorded a 57-game hitting streak and a perfect game, and couldn’t use his right hand the next day, so he signed with his left hand.

Doesn’t it sound rare just by hearing the name?

“Mom, Mom. What does this say?”

“Um, I don’t know. Maybe Swan wrote ‘Swan’ in his native language?”

No, ma’am. That’s the alphabet······.

Ah······. Should I practice signing with my left hand?

***

Wander Franco was unlucky this season.

It wasn’t that his BABIP [Batting Average on Balls In Play] was a mess. His BABIP this season was a whopping 0.07 higher than the average, and that high BABIP was directly linked to his performance. In fact, if you only look at this, it was no exaggeration to say that he was having an unusually lucky season. Considering that his performance was originally at the MVP contender level, the performance he was putting up this year was clearly good enough to win the MVP in a normal year.

But.

57 consecutive games with a hit.

33 home runs before the end of June.

And a perfect game.

The guy who stole the Player of the Month award from him in April and May was finally running to steal the Player of the Month award in June.

Choi. Su. Won.

To Wander Franco, it was a name like a nightmare.

But even so, he didn’t give up.

Choi Su-won is scheduled to miss 2 of the remaining 4 games this month. The number of home runs he recorded this month was a whopping 16. Honestly, it’s impossible to catch up with that number of home runs in the remaining period. But considering that more than half of those home runs, nine of them, came from Coors Field [known for being hitter-friendly due to its altitude], and that he has already monopolized the Player of the Month and Rookie awards for two months, there was still a good chance of aiming for the Player of the Month award if he only went up to a similar level.

-Clang!!!!!

[Wander Franco!! A huge hit!! Fence!! Fence!! Over the fence!!]

[Wander Franco’s 28th home run of the season, showing a really fierce hit in today’s game!!]

[4 hits, 3 runs batted in, 1 walk. Wander Franco is really showing what a blazing bat is today.]

The third game against the Toronto Blue Jays.

Wander Franco tightened the reins once again and showed off a performance worthy of the expression “blazing bat.” Of course, the game was won, and he was named the player of the game. It was truly a last spurt towards the June Player of the Month award.

“I played with the thought of wanting to lead the team to victory rather than focusing on records. I think records are just by-products of good play.”

He finished the Player of the Game interview in style.

Now there are three games left.

If he played all the remaining games like today, he might really be able to win the June Player of the Month award this time… No, he *will* be able to win the Player of the Month award.

“Boss, are you okay?”

“Huh? What?”

Evan Murphy, who had finished showering first, asked him a sudden question.

Ah, could it be?

What came to his mind at that moment was, *What the hell did that crazy Choi Su-won do again?*

He hurriedly opened the smartphone he had put in his locker.

Since the name Choi Su-won was already at the top of the search terms, it didn’t take long to press the search button.

─Choi Su-won, 57 consecutive games with a hit. Misses the third game of the series.

─Choi Su-won completely dispels doubts about pitching and hitting with a perfect pitching performance.

─Choi Su-won, who broke the Yankees’ D rule [likely refers to a team rule about rest or workload].

.

.

.

─Required at-bats & Required innings. Will Choi Su-won be able to reach it?

He scrolled down for a long time, but he didn’t see any special news.

Then what does that question of whether he’s okay mean?

Wander Franco turned his head and gave Evan Murphy, who was looking at him with an awkward expression, a look urging him to explain.

“Uh… That is… All-Star…”

“All-Star? What about it?”

When he last checked, the difference in votes was almost 300,000 votes.

And that difference was getting bigger and bigger. Yes, it certainly was.

!?

2.87 million votes?

For a moment, Wander Franco doubted that his eyes were wrong.

That’s because Choi Su-won’s vote count, who went straight to the All-Star Game without a final vote as the overall No. 1 in the first vote, was just over 3 million votes. But Anthony Volpe has 2.87 million votes?

“What is this?”

It was the effect of protecting Choi Su-won’s perfect game in yesterday’s game, which was watched by nearly half of the 50 million people.

2028 season.

Wander Franco was unlucky.

Very terribly.