episode_0130

“Isn’t it strange? Yongbyeong, Kim Hyun-sik, Choi Jung-hoon, Yongbyeong, Hwang Dae-hyun. And another mercenary.”

Before the game started, Woo Kwan-hyung gathered all the players. When Woo Kwan-hyung asked if it was strange, I couldn’t find anything strange, but the other players seemed to sympathize with it.

“What’s strange?”

And since I’m not one to just hold back questions, I threw a fastball right away.

“Hey, hey.”

Seongtae Yoon stabbed me in the side, but I batted away his finger and looked at Gwanhyeong Woo. In response to my question, Woo Kwan-hyung sighed once and told me the answer to my question.

“Meng Hao. “Why does the club use mercenaries?”

“Of course, they will be better than the Korean kids. “Well, if you look at the kids who came here, they probably don’t do anything special.”

The interpreter’s face was colored with embarrassment at my words, but it wasn’t something I cared about.

“Yes, they are probably better than Korean kids. And as you know, Choi Joong-hoon was a national team pitcher, right?”

“yes.”

“Hwang Dae-hyun is also the next-generation ace raised by Hyun-seong. In other words, the opponent’s ace pitchers are flocking against us. Do you understand what I mean?”

“well?”

Aren’t they just pitchers? It didn’t seem like anything was wrong. To be honest, everyone except Go Young-hwan looked like they were there.

“These bastards saw us as shit and forced us into rotation. This is it. Right?”

“Yes, as Sangju said, the pitchers who must win are used against us. In other words, we are being looked down upon.”

Is that belittling? It was a statement that gave the illusion that Ohtani, Verlander, and Cole were being selected as starters in succession, but I was not in the mood to bring up such a topic, so I just nodded.

“okay. It’s a little hard to say it with my own mouth, but honestly, we deserved to be ignored so far. My grades weren’t that good either. but!”

At Woo Kwan-hyung’s words, all the players looked at Woo Kwan-hyung with eyes full of enthusiasm.

“Let me show you! How valuable the sweat we shed in winter was. And let’s make sure they never use this arrogant rotation again! “You can do it, right?”

“”yes!””

“invincibility!”

““AT!””

“let’s go!”

Before the game started, the morale of the players was rising to the point where it was hard to believe that they had lost in a row as Woo Kwan-hyung gathered.

‘Those guys who steal signs are good at talking.’

‘They all steal autographs.’

‘Well, that’s true.’

Anyway, my mentality was messed up. Rossby just seemed displeased with the whole thing.

Tsk, should I make Rossby feel better by having sex with a woman other than Soyoung today? Of course, I did it with Jo-eun yesterday, but Rossby seemed to want new stimulation.

‘hmm… . Should I call Dongjin for the first time in a while and go to a club? … Ah, Hancheol has just gone on an expedition. I don’t think Seungcheol will go. Junhu went down to Icheon. hmm… . Wonho?’

Now that I think about it, Wonho is still in the Silla 1st team. We exchanged greetings before the game started. I thought it wouldn’t be a bad idea to hang out with Wonho after a long time.

“ruler! Then let’s focus and go on defense!”

“yes!”

Today’s starting pitcher is Janson, a mercenary pitcher who was selected as the first starter within AT. Although they lost the opening game, they got off to a quality start, allowing 3 runs in 6 innings.

‘Tsk tsk. Since when did it become considered a record to only go 6 innings and give up 3 runs? ‘I feel like baseball isn’t baseball these days.’

‘Why are you so angry again?’

‘That was in my time. If the starting pitcher didn’t throw a complete game that day, he was criticized for being an asshole. Even if I couldn’t do it, I had to go 8 innings to be treated as a starting pitcher. But these days, starting pitchers are evaluated based on unheard-of records, such as quality starts and all, even if they only allow 3 runs in 6 innings, so it’s hard not to get annoyed, right?

‘Well, it’s funny to make such a fuss about something that doesn’t even matter.’

Although Rossby was a very dissatisfied person, this time I agreed with his dissatisfaction. 3 runs in 6 innings is an ERA of 4.50. In fact, it didn’t seem like an exceptional record, even calling it a quality start.

However, if you read the words or articles of the power analysis team, it was funny to see that a certain pitcher had several quality starts last year.

‘Shouldn’t we select a pitcher who doesn’t even have such crappy records?’

… Until I spoke with Rossby, I had no idea how great the record of quality starts was.

*

Shinra Triggers. A strong team that has never been eliminated from fall baseball in nearly 10 years. When the team was founded in the mid-to-late 2000s, it was a team that was in the bottom tier with teams such as the AT Thunders and Hwasan Falcons, but in the 2010s, it was a team that quickly emerged as a strong team by showing strengths in training and trade. Of course, at the center of it all was Choi Joo-tae, Korea’s all-time shortstop.

Anyway, as it was such a strong team, there were many familiar faces. Eun-chong Lee at second base and Hwan-young Kim at first base. And even Park Cheol-young, who is standing at bat. The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd batters were all from national universities. Just like us.

‘The blow seems similar… . After all, the problem is pitching ability?’

The team’s first starter has been on base since the first inning… . Janson’s appearance from second base looked unreliable as expected. Moreover, because he was a left-handed hitter for three consecutive batters, the sight of him throwing the ball excessively and bleeding from the first inning was lowering the morale of the fielders.

Ta – evil!

‘Alright, it’s flying.’

It felt like the batted ball hitting the fence wasn’t real. Nevertheless, my body was running to the outfield to broadcast like it was a habit. Right fielder Woo Gwan-hyung threw the ball to me, who came out to greet me with a skillful fence play.

‘The runner on second base has already entered, should I block second base?’

“home!”

‘Throw it home!’

When Woo Kwan-hyung and Rossby shouted at the same time and glanced over their shoulders to look at the infield, first base runner Kim Hwan-young was already circling third base, perhaps aware of Woo Kwan-hyung’s weak shoulders.

‘You bastard!’

“This is crossing the line!”

I quickly took the ball out and threw it until my shoulder fell off. The ball I threw cuts through the wind and flies straight to home.

“Did you catch it?”

And Jeong Yun-cheol, who received the ball, touched Kim Hwan-young’s body as he slid in. Because it was so far away, I couldn’t see if I had hit the groove first. Is it three leaves? Or out?

And my doubts about the decision did not last long.

“out!!!”

“nice!”

“Meng Hao! Sorry, it was good.”

“Well, I crossed the line to run from first base to home while being slow on the feet.”

I can understand ignoring Woo Gwan-hyeong’s shoulder, but he’s running all the way to home while I’m holding on during the broadcast.

I made eye contact with Kim Hwan-young, who turned around and looked at me as if he was disappointed about being out. After laughing lightly, I cut his throat a few times with the blade of my hand.

‘Seniors. From now on, just look at who is on the broadcast and run.’

In my gesture, I saw Kim Hwan-young raise his middle finger so that the camera wouldn’t catch it, but I didn’t feel bad because it was just a cute complaint from a loser.

“Is your shoulder still the same?”

Upon returning to second base, Park Cheol-young, who took advantage of the throw to home and ran all the way to second base, was waiting.

“Senior, you’re still playing well.”

“Ha, if it weren’t for the injury at that time. “You probably won’t be able to play as a starter right now.”

“Then we would have been eliminated in the semifinals.”

“I’m not saying it’s wrong, but it makes me unlucky.”

As I was talking with Park Cheol-young, Silla’s mercenary batter came to bat.

Lasiel Puig. A player who was selected as an All-Star and ranked second in Major League Rookie of the Year. He was a hitter who became such a hot topic that even I, who had no interest in Korean baseball, heard that Puig was coming to Korea. It was impressive that his body looked strong, as expected from a major league player. I can feel Jansson getting nervous about Puig’s appearance.

‘Hmm, but is it because I saw too many major leaguers at the WBC? ‘I don’t feel so intimidated that I feel nervous like that, do I?’

To be honest, in the final against the United States, it felt like every time each player stepped up to the plate, things were going to get messy, but Puig didn’t seem to be that bad.

‘Well, there are Korean hitters who hit better than Puig. The same goes for Seungcheol. Now rather than that… .’

After putting aside my thoughts about Puig, I watched what second base runner Park Cheol-young did. Teams like the AT Thunders also steal signs to win, and it was thought that the strong team Shilla Triggers would do the same.

‘Mr. Rossby, is there anything strange?’

‘bastard. ‘If I knew that, it would be God.’

‘Hey, wasn’t Mr. Rossby the god of baseball? To be honest, Babe Ruth also hit two, but in terms of hitter, he is far below Mr. Rossby.’

‘Hehe, that’s true. ‘Because he’s a guy who can’t even hit .400.’

‘Well, since he’s the god of baseball, you might see something strange, right?’

‘Umm… .’

Rossby seemed to be in a good mood as I gently praised him and began to watch closely to see if Park Cheol-young was behaving strangely. And our battery signed off.

‘how is it?’

‘well? ‘I don’t really feel anything strange.’

‘So Silla doesn’t steal autographs?’

‘I can’t say for sure that that’s the case. Even if you steal a sign, the other person may notice, so you may be refraining from even important situations.’

‘I guess so.’

Even if you know the signs, if you signal at each scoring point like an idiot, you will get caught right away. But wouldn’t it be easy to notice if you suddenly do something strange? Stealing signs seemed more difficult than I thought.

‘Well, it doesn’t matter because I have Mr. Rossby.’

Right then! And the sound of a bat being hit was heard. An ordinary ground ball to second base. With familiar hands, he caught the batted ball and threw it to first base, creating a second out count.

‘I thought I’d miss it because I was thinking about other things, but I caught it.’

‘Hey, it’s been a few years since I’ve been playing baseball jjambap, but I’m missing something like this. ‘It’s not even a booty.’

And with two outs, the Silla Triggers’ attack came to an end in the top of the first inning when Janson struck out the fifth batter. One run allowed in the first inning, which was disappointing considering the performance of a foreign pitcher, but it was a reasonable score since the Silla Triggers’ batting line was also strong.

‘I said that episodes 1 and 5 were the most difficult. Well, it’s about 1 point so I can turn it over.’