Just Throw It
I'd pitched nearly perfect ball through three innings, but the moment the fourth opened with runners on first and second and nobody out, my head went blank.
…What is this?
Up until just a few minutes ago, the hitters hadn't been able to do a thing with my fastball. Yet the second the fourth inning started, my four-seamers stopped drawing clean whiffs, and every time I left a pitch over the plate, they squared it up.
It wasn't just about winning or losing. My goal was to finish this game clean and lock down a first-team start, so even with a comfortable 5–0 lead, the pressure was starting to settle in.
Catcher Kim Gyeongmo must have felt it too. He pulled off his mask and jogged out to the mound.
"Sorry, sorry. Guess I got too hung up on the fastball."
He tried to take the blame and settle me down right away, but the fastball-heavy plan had been something we'd built together the night before. It wasn't on him alone.
"No, sir. I was thinking the same thing, so I stuck with it. More than that — it feels like the hitters have changed their approach."
I'd felt it clearly in Kang Seungcheol's at-bat.
Four straight four-seamers had kept him late, and then he'd put a clean, well-timed swing on the slider.
When he kept fouling off the four-seamers, I'd thought he was simply getting overpowered. Looking back, he'd been sitting on the slider from the start — that was why his timing was late on the heat.
"Yeah. They're coming up with a real plan now. Watching Kang Seungcheol, he was hunting the slider the whole way."
"…So what do we do?"
"…Hmm."
Neither of us had a sharp answer. Counting the cutter as a lefty-side fastball, my only real breaking ball was the slider. And with Blockhead Thrower in play, normal location work was off the table.
Building a whole new pattern from here was basically impossible.
Kim Gyeongmo thought for a moment, then lifted his head like something had clicked.
"Just get hit."
"…What?"
He grinned. The line came out of nowhere and left me staring, but he kept going.
"I mean it. Stop fretting over location. Just throw it."
"What do you mean by that…?"
The hitters were sitting on specific pitches, and he wanted me to just chuck it in there. I couldn't make sense of it.
"I've got a plan. Trust me once and throw. Just get it in the zone. Don't try to paint every corner."
"…Understood."
His face said he wasn't joking. Faced with that seriousness, I agreed for now, and he pulled his mask back on and headed for home plate.
…What is he thinking?
The brief, question-filled meeting ended, and the next hitter stepped in.
Cleanup hitter Park Taesan.
The lefty filled the box so completely that the whole left side of the plate felt crowded — a frame big enough to press down on you just by standing there.
His swing matched the size: huge. Hitters like that were usually easy to fool with off-speed stuff, which made sealing away a good changeup against lefties all the more frustrating.
I watched Kim Gyeongmo work the PitchCom, and a moment later the call came through my earpiece.
— Cutter.
He set the mitt dead center and edged it just a hair toward the body. Exactly as he'd said in the meeting — no joke. Get it in the zone. That was the whole idea.
…He really wants me to throw it like this?
I still wasn't sold, but I'd already decided to trust him, so I didn't dwell on it.
I drew a long breath and went into the windup.
Shiiing—
The ball left my fingertips low and moved just a touch at the end.
Not a wild miss, but not a well-located pitch either — something in between. Naturally, Park Taesan's bat came after it.
— Crack!
The contact sounded solid enough to make me flinch.
The ball jumped hard and rolled straight toward second.
It was a very quick grounder, but it was hit right at the second baseman, so Kim Jaeseong simply took a step back and presented his glove cleanly.
At the same time, shortstop Kang Daegeun was already charging across the bag at second.
Park Taesan was a slow runner, so Kim Jaeseong had all the time in the world to pull the ball from his glove and flip it to Kang Daegeun.
Kang Daegeun took the toss, brushed the base in one smooth motion, then turned his body and used the recoil to fire toward first.
Pap!
A throw so fast and true it looked like he was showing off that arm of his.
"Out!"
Just like that, the double play was complete.
…That worked?
It had been a soft, hittable pitch right down the middle of nowhere. The ball had been a grounder, sure, but the exit velocity proved he'd caught it on the sweet spot — it was flying. A foot or two more to the left and it would have split first and second for a hit.
But the result was a grounder to second all the same. Moments earlier we'd been staring at nobody out and runners on first and second; one swing later, two outs were on the board and it was two down with a man on third.
My eyes drifted from second to first and then naturally down to home plate. Kim Gyeongmo had pulled off his mask and was shaking his mitt at me with a grin.
"See?"
I could read it on his lips clear as day.
I nodded.
I was still half in a daze.
…What just happened?
The daze didn't last. The next hitter stepped in, and I locked back into the game.
Fifth hitter Lee Jiseong. Smaller than Park Taesan, but only by comparison — Lee was a solidly built hitter in his own right.
I watched Kim Gyeongmo and waited for a sign. He just held the mitt open and stood there. No PitchCom. No mitt movement at all.
…What? Why is he just standing there?
I could see the pitch clock bleeding down.
Twenty, nineteen, eighteen—
"…"
With one second left, I finally threw over to third.
Thud!
The third baseman caught it easy and tagged the runner.
A pickoff at third with two outs and a man on third. Not a call you'd normally make — but the pitch clock had left me no choice.
I took the ball back from the third baseman and looked at Kim Gyeongmo again.
What are you thinking, seriously…
And right as the thought formed—
— Slider.
The PitchCom finally called for a slider.
But the mitt location was wrong. Against a right-handed hitter, you usually throw the slider away and chase the whiff. Instead—
Sss—
Kim Gyeongmo set the mitt in on the hands. And once again, not jammed tight — somewhere close to the middle of the plate.
I couldn't read him at all. Fastballs were one thing. A slider to that spot?
"Haa…"
A sigh slipped out on its own. The last at-bat had been lucky more than anything — that had been hard contact. Was I really going to get another ball hit straight at a fielder?
Kim Gyeongmo held the mitt steady and looked at me with that blank, deadpan stare of his. Like he was telling me to trust him.
…Ah, whatever.
I shut the thinking down and went into the windup.
For now, I was going to believe.
A wild pitch has occurred!
…Of all times!
The wild-pitch alert, right when I'd almost forgotten it existed. If it had hit on a four-seamer I might have lived with it — but of course it came on the slider.
The ball started in on right-handed Lee Jiseong, then broke and drifted dead over the heart of the plate.
Please… just let nothing happen.
I squeezed my eyes shut and prayed.
And then—
"Strike!"
Against every fear I had, Lee Jiseong never moved. The ball ran straight down the middle for a called strike.
Kim Gyeongmo caught it and fired it right back to me. Then—
— Slider.
He worked the PitchCom before I'd even finished catching the ball.
Same spot as before: just off center, in on the hands. I still had no idea what he was after, but the urgency in the way he moved put me straight into the delivery.
A wild pitch has occurred!
And it happened again. On top of that, rushing into the delivery meant I never got a clean scrape on the slider.
No break at all — a hanging slider floating into the middle of the zone.
I already knew how this one ended.
— Crack!
Lee Jiseong yanked it hard, and the ball climbed in a hurry.
It cleared the infield at a vicious clip and headed for the outfield.
…It's over.
The farther the ball drifted toward the wall, the more it felt like my first-team call-up was flying away with it.
Sick of watching, I tore my eyes off the ball and took it out on the mound, kicking at the dirt.
My gaze met Lee Jiseong's as he rounded the bases. The easy way he took first base just made him more annoying. But a pitcher who'd just given up a home run had nothing left to do except keep abusing the rubber.
And then—
Lee Jiseong, who'd been jogging the bases just fine, suddenly stopped dead with a blank, devastated look on his face.
…What?
I snapped my head up toward the outfield.
Right in front of the wall, left fielder Park Taejeong was running this way with his glove up. He pulled something out of it and threw to shortstop Kang Daegeun.
A baseball.
…He caught it?
I couldn't believe it.
A ball that had looked gone to anyone watching was somehow sitting in Park Taejeong's glove.