Episode 3
“What was that, sunbae?!”
Choi Minsu stared at me in shock after failing to catch the ball he had tried to receive.
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
I raised a hand in apology.
“My control’s a total mess, right? It’ll settle down after a few more throws.”
I wasn’t just saying that. The feel was coming back. I simply hadn’t fully adjusted to my regressed body yet.
You could call it a disconnect between my senses and my body.
I’d suffered quite a bit from this during my first regression.
But I had already gone through the trial and error.
“No, that’s not what I meant…”
“Sorry. Really. Just catch a few more for me.”
“…Sigh. Yes, sunbae. Go ahead.”
It felt like Minsu’s tone had subtly changed. Anyway…
My second pitch also missed its target.
At least this time it went somewhere Minsu could catch.
The third and fourth pitches also sailed outside the zone.
Whoosh!
Bang!
On the fifth pitch, the ball finally entered the square.
The sixth one did too, right into the strike zone.
“OK! I’ve got my bearings!”
Of course, saying my control was fixed just because two balls hit the zone was nonsense.
I still had a long way to go.
But it was a path I’d walked before. It wouldn’t take too long.
“Hey! Song Seongjun!”
Coach Park Junseok was walking into the indoor training facility when he spotted Minsu and me and strode over.
“I told you to rest. What are you doing?”
He asked with a smile. He looked amused.
If this had happened during practice, he might’ve been angry.
But it was break time.
“If I say rest, then rest. Getting proper rest is important too, you know?”
“Coach!”
Minsu suddenly cut in.
“Song Seongjun sunbae’s pitches are faster than Kim Jewoo sunbae’s!”
“Huh? What are you talking about?”
“I just caught his pitches.”
“Yeah, I saw you two playing around.”
“They were heavy and fast. I always catch Kim Jewoo sunbae’s bullpen sessions, so I know. Song Seongjun sunbae’s pitches were much faster.”
At Minsu’s insistence, Coach Park tilted his head and looked at me.
“Hey, Song Seongjun. Have you been training as a pitcher on the side? Didn’t you just say you were doing extra personal training?”
When I arranged for private sports training,
I had informed the school.
“I’ve been doing a bit of pitching work on my own for a while.”
He might ask why I hadn’t informed them about pitching training the way I had about personal training.
But if I didn’t lay down groundwork like this, there’d be no explanation for why I was throwing up now.
“Well, I’ll be.”
Coach Park glanced at me, then turned back to Minsu.
“Minsu, are you sure the ball’s fast?”
Minsu nodded firmly.
“Really? Then throw one for me. Let me see.”
He even grabbed a speed gun from the equipment room.
One guy was saying the ball was faster than Kim Jewoo’s.
The other claimed he’d been secretly training as a pitcher.
Unless the two of us had staged some prank,
We wouldn’t just make that up.
Coach Park looked at me, then back at the speed gun.
From his expression, I could tell he hadn’t expected much.
“Your shoulder hasn’t cooled off, right?”
“No, sir.”
“Then throw.”
Watching my form, Coach Park thought at least one thing was true… I had trained.
From the windup to the follow-through.
‘I learned it properly, didn’t I?’
Then the baseball left my hand and struck Minsu’s mitt.
Bang!
Oh. That sound was good.
Coach Park lowered his gaze to the speed gun. The velocity seemed decent.
[150 km/h]
“…Huh?”
He hadn’t expected 150.
“Coach! One more!”
“…Y-Yeah. Throw again.”
As he aimed the speed gun again, he thought:
It must be an error.
It’s not like 150 grows on trees.
High school pitchers had definitely gotten faster lately.
In the past, seeing 150 was rare… one or two guys at most.
Now, around twenty pitchers hit 150 every year.
Of course, most of them only touched 150 once before their velocity gradually dipped.
There aren’t many high school pitchers who can consistently throw 150 km/h.
Whoosh!
Bang!
[151 km/h]
Bang!
[149 km/h]
Bang!
[152 km/h]
.
.
.
I threw ten pitches.
Every single one was hovering around 150.
“Is this real?”
After checking the radar gun again, Coach Park raised his head and looked at me.
“Coach.”
I wasn’t done speaking.
“May I throw one at full strength?”
He had no idea that I meant a truly full effort.
“What about the ones you just threw? Those weren’t full strength?”
“No, sir. My control’s not locked in yet.”
“…Is that so?”
He had seen the readings with his own eyes. What could he say?
“Please keep in mind it might sail!”
“Y-Yeah. Control. It can sail.”
My words about losing control barely registered with him.
All he heard was: it’s going to be even faster.
Oddly, Minsu was the one being realistic.
“Sunbae! Are you going full strength here? Time, time! I need to put on another glove!”
Complaining that his palm would burn, Minsu scrambled to find an extra glove.
During that short break,
I calmly checked my condition.
The disconnect between body and feel is bigger than I thought.
Expecting that gap to close in a single day would be greedy.
It would take time to regain command.
I’d also have to manage my balance carefully while still growing.
Even in America, I’d grown taller until my second year in the minors.
But I’d walked this road before.
It wasn’t impossible.
“Sunbae! I’m ready!”
Minsu now had double gloves on and said he was good to go.
That would only dull his movements.
He must know that.
But he figured there was no choice if he had to catch something fast right now.
I went into my windup.
This time, I poured everything into it.
Whoooooosh!
BAAANG!
The mitt exploded with sound.
Minsu, the one who said he had double gloves, was wildly shaking his mitt.
And Coach Park’s eyes went wide.
[155 km/h]
The radar gun showed 155.
“Shit. Is that right?”
Catchers need strong arms to stop steals.
If your arm’s weak, you can’t play catcher.
So he had expected a decent pitch.
But still…
“Does 155 even make sense?”
Coach Park Junseok was speechless.
My velocity was lower than Moon Seungchan, the one who had sparked last year’s ‘Moon Seungchan League’ craze by throwing 157.
But it was faster than Seong Jinsung and Yoo Hyundo, this year’s top three high school pitchers.
“Song Seongjun! Since when have you been training as a pitcher?”
“A little over a year!”
It had actually been far longer.
But I gave him an answer he could accept.
A year is believable, right?
***
At Seongun High, Head Coach Bae Seonggon was watching the online bracket draw in his office.
The President’s Cup featured:
Teams that reached the round of 16 in the E-Mart Cup,
the quarterfinalists of the Golden Lion and Blue Dragon tournaments,
and the winners of the second-half weekend leagues.
Since the drawing was computerized, the results came quickly.
Out of 42 teams,
Seongun High’s first-round opponent was decided…
Jeongchun High.
Coach Bae frowned.
“Of all teams… Jeongchun High.”
He suddenly craved a cigarette he had quit.
No team at the President’s Cup would be easy. But some were very hard.
Jeongchun High was very hard.
Their pitching staff was ridiculous.
There was Moon Seungchan, the one who had electrified the KBO last year with 157.
Cho Hyeongseo had a powerful 150 km/h fastball.
And Jung Minseong consistently threw high-140s with excellent control.
Three ace-level pitchers on one team… wasn’t that almost cheating?
It wasn’t strange to sigh at that bracket.
He had hoped to redeem their Blue Dragon elimination at the President’s Cup.
Compared to teams that had played more tournaments, they should have a conditioning edge.
But reality was…
The first round won’t be easy.
Just then, someone knocked.
It was Coach Park Junseok.
His face was subtly flushed.
“Hey. Coach Kim. Did you start day-drinking?”
“Day-drinking? No way. Smell my breath if you want.”
Coach Park leaned forward.
“That’s enough. Get lost.”
Bae waved him off.
Maybe because he’d lured this guy back after military service, promising baseball again, he felt the man had grown cheekier with age.
“So, what is it?”
“Coach, you know Song Seongjun?”
“Yeah. What about him?”
The only player on Seongun High that almost certain to go in the first round of the draft.
‘Now that I think about it, there were rumors that MLB teams were interested in him, too.’
But high school catchers signing with MLB teams were incredibly rare.
He doubted Seongjun would actually sign.
“Rather than explain it, watch this first.”
Coach Park handed over his phone.
A video was already playing.
“…Is that Song Seongjun?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why’s he on the mound?”
Coach Bae’s dialect thickened when he got flustered.
“Just watch.”
“Okay. Okay.”
As he watched, the pitch didn’t look ordinary.
“Hey, Coach Park. Since when does Choi Minsu make mitt sounds like that to please pitchers?”
He admitted Minsu showed promise. That’s why he sometimes started him against weaker or less important opponents.
“He hit 155, Coach.”
“155 would make the mitt explode like that. 155 would…”
Then he paused.
“…What? 155? Who?”
“Song Seongjun. You just saw it.”
“For real?”
“Yes. I watched from start to finish. I recorded it.”
Coach Park’s expression left no room for doubt.
“When did he learn to throw like that?”
“He said he’s been secretly preparing for over a year.”
“…Ha.”
Coach Bae could only laugh hollowly.
Speechless didn’t even begin to cover it.
After a long silence, Coach Park cautiously asked:
“Coach… do we know our first opponent yet?”
Careful. As if afraid he might jinx it.
“Jeongchun High.”
“…What? Jeongchun?”
“Yeah. You think that’s crazy, too, right?”
Crazy didn’t even describe it.
They had been eliminated twice by Jeongchun this year.
Hitting-wise, they could compete.
Pitching had always been the problem.
“But if that’s the case… couldn’t we land a big punch?”
A pitcher who throws 155…
Isn’t that a secret weapon?
“Coach, he’s never pitched in an actual game.”
Park objected immediately.
Yes, Seongjun had played the most games…
But as the starting catcher.
At least at Seongun High, he had never once pitched in a real game.
“I know. I know. But if he prepared in secret for a year and reached that level… If you stick to him for three weeks and coach him closely, couldn’t we try?”
“…Are you serious?”
“Try it. Let’s try first, then talk. If it doesn’t work, we drop it. It wasn’t a card we had anyway.”
It wasn’t a card we had anyway.
He wasn’t wrong.
If it didn’t work, they could pretend it never happened.
There wasn’t really any risk.
…Right?
Even so,
Having served under this head coach for years,
There were moments he simply didn’t understand him.
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