The MLB Prospect

The delivery driver climbed the stairs and double-checked the unit number in front of his destination.

"Unit 201. This is the place."

Knock knock ─

He knocked lightly, and from inside came a clattering commotion and the sound of someone moving about. Any second now, he figured, someone would come to the door and take the food.

"Delivery!"

Wondering if he'd imagined it, he called out and knocked again — and this time, total silence answered him.

There was definitely someone in there...

Some people simply hated face-to-face encounters, so the driver let it go, set the food down in front of the door, and snapped a photo.

Send the photo and message to the customer, and done. Finished with the delivery, he hurried off toward his next stop.

All that remained in the corridor the driver left behind was a snow-white plastic bag, the scent of hot food curling up from it. And then —

Creeeeak ─...

From the stealthily opening door, a pair of twitching ears swept the hallway left and right before a hand of snow-pale skin snatched up the delivery and darted back inside.

This creature... don't tell me he was watching me from somewhere?

"Urk..."

No, that one crosses a line.

Whatever she looked like on the outside, her mind was entirely her own — which made watching hundreds of viewers hurl cheesy lines at her simultaneously an ordeal of no small measure.

And honey, of all things? The mere thought sent a faint ripple of discomfort up her spine.

"Now then, on to the matter of today's broadcast."

Tearing open the chicken wrapper, she brought up a slide of materials on the screen. A large title appeared in the center.

"As it happens, today is Monday — no baseball games — so we shall take this opportunity to examine the domestic pitchers most likely to make it to the Major Leagues!"

Tch. This is why perceptive believers are so insufferable.

She had denied it with great passion, but sadly, not a single soul bought it.

She stole a glance at the chat. Until yesterday, her calls had been little more than an entertaining bit. But things were a little different now.

Because she knew, too.

What she had seen in yesterday's game was no mere analysis, and no hunch. It had been a scene that would actually come to pass in the future.

"First, then... my dear believers."

She picked up a piece of chicken.

"What do you believe matters most in reaching the Major Leagues?"

She let out a soft laugh and advanced to the next slide. Several categories appeared on the first page.

"Everything my believers have named is indeed important. However, one must not judge by the stat sheet alone."

"Allow me to demonstrate."

She brought up two hypothetical pitchers on the screen.

"My believers — between these two pitchers, who seems the better one to you?"

"Hmm. I see."

She nodded.

"That is what most would think. And yet, judging MLB potential from this data alone is a flawed approach."

She pulled up footage of Player A pitching. He was a rookie-grade arm who rarely appeared as a starter, so hardly anyone knew his face in detail. This scouting footage, too, was material she had gathered personally through her own reporting and interviews.

"This pitcher's 152-kilometer-per-hour fastball is, in truth, extremely fast."

"For all that velocity, his command is solid — but he rarely forces batters into whiffs. The reason is a lack of weapons that could serve as his out pitch—"

"Hmm. How to put this simply... If hitters merely adapt to his velocity, he'll keep getting hammered by contact and fail to eat innings — or, fearing the long ball, he'll be unable to throw his riskier putaway pitches. In other words..."

She froze the frame. It seemed a more careful explanation was in order.

"What matters to a pitcher is not merely the number written on a radar gun. It is how fast that ball truly looks to the batter. Where it moves, and how."

"And given where a batter's bat begins its swing — how does the ball arrive? Is that approach being adjusted in real time?"

"That is what you must watch for."

She picked up a chicken wing.

"Baseball is not a sport played with the body alone! In the Majors especially, you face a same-league opponent as many as twelve to sixteen times a season, and an interleague opponent perhaps three or four times at most."

"There are fifteen teams each in the American and National Leagues. So the team you meet today may well be the one you faced six months ago — and of all days, an unfamiliar pitcher or hitter you've never seen before might just be taking the mound or stepping into the box."

That was precisely why the game demanded so much: monstrous individual talents pouring in from teams across the globe, each hitter carrying a different physical profile, different preferred pitch types — the list of things a pitcher had to weigh while competing went on and on.

Which meant a pitcher had to be clever.

Even ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a pitcher who threw to the same excellent spots every single day — if he could not change his pitch mix depending on the hitter, adjust his stuff, and find ways to sync with his catcher, then no matter how hard he threw, he would not survive in the Majors.

"Now then, my believers. Let me ask once more. Between A and B — which pitcher is more likely to reach the Majors?"

Both were players still shy of their peak. Whether they succeeded in America or not depended, one could fairly say, on whether their growth bloomed fully or not.

Player A, for instance, was currently pacing anxiously in the fourth-starter slot for lack of a true out pitch — yet with his exceptional command, he was already dissecting hitters' psyches with surgical precision.

She had been keeping a close eye on both pitchers. If it were possible, she hoped they would both grow and set foot on Major League soil.

There was nothing in particular to hide, so after a moment's deliberation, she revealed both pitchers' names.

A. Ryu Hyun-ji. B. Kim Byung-woon.

"Fufu. It is only natural you do not know Kim Byung-woon, for he is a player I have been watching with personal interest. In truth, he is not a KBO player at all — he is currently a university player."

When had it been? About a year ago, she had briefly visited Sungkyunkwan University to cover the college league. There, by pure chance, she had crossed paths with Kim Byung-woon — the very man who would be starting tomorrow.

Watching him train had been enough. She had been certain then: at minimum, this prospect would grow into a top-of-the-rotation starter in the domestic league.

True, the underhand delivery carried a high risk of shoulder trouble — but his signature pitch had a distinctive bite to it, and plenty of competitive edge.

Not that it stopped the editor-in-chief from cursing me out — 'You're pinning that kind of hope on a kid who barely cracks 140?' Well, excuuse me~

A man who understood baseball as nothing more than strikes and velocity, and he was the editor-in-chief. Looking back on it now, quitting that job had absolutely been the right call.

"Now then, on to the next group of players—"

The same hour. The strategy analysis team office of the Asung Giants Fox ballclub.

An employee in charge of game analysis was staring at his monitor when his hand suddenly stopped.

"Huh? Team Leader."

The team leader in the next seat turned his head. "What is it?"

"Could you take a look at this?"

The employee pointed at his monitor. On the screen, alongside footage of yesterday's game, a clip from a certain female streamer's broadcast was playing.

"Well... she's not wrong."

It was a textbook opening — the raw, festering frustration of a fan watching a game slip away by inches.

But moments later, the instant the catcher flashed his sign — like a marionette with its strings cut, she slumped back into her chair and muttered in resignation:

And before the words had even finished leaving her mouth —

Noh Si-hwan's grand slam followed, almost immediately.

"This isn't a video edited after the game ended, is it?"

"No. It's a livestream recording."

"Really?"

"Yes."

The team leader rewound the clip again and again. A coincidence? Most people would assume a game is lost once the bases are loaded with nobody out, so it could be nothing more than that...

Just to be sure, the employee ran the stream from the very beginning. The team leader received the channel address from him, watched it through once as an ordinary viewer, and then went back through it a second time — this time with the eyes of Asung's strategy analysis team leader.

The catcher's signs. The infield positioning. The pitcher's recent pattern of pitches.

And then the synthesis of it all.

It was as if some inside insider were walking her through each hitter's tendencies and weaknesses one by one — as if she had a complete grasp of what was going through the hitter's, the pitcher's, and the catcher's heads all at once.

From which pitch was coming to whether the batter's bat would come off his shoulder, she was calling it with accuracy that bordered on prophecy.

Is this even possible...?

Saying "if that pitch comes, he'll probably swing" is one thing. But knowing what pitch the pitcher was about to throw, down to the spot where the batter's bat would be baited into swinging — that was another entirely.

"Interesting."

If this were real, she was a treasure of a find — the kind of talent you knelt before and begged to join you. If she could simply be locked in a room, trained on footage of every other team's pitchers and hitters, and have tactical sheets distributed to the entire roster by the day before each game...

"First place... might actually be worth another shot."

"Team Leader? Where are you going?"

"I'm off to get the Director's direct sign-off."

"Huh?"

Only the employee's bewildered voice echoed through the office as the team leader headed for the director's office without so much as a backward glance.

Knock knock ─

"Director, I'm coming in."

"Oh? Team Leader Lee Do-hyun, yahoo~ What brings you all the way here?"

He entered at the light knock to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠find a blonde woman leisurely trimming her nails mid-phone call — the owner of the ballclub — who greeted him with a wave.

"Let's talk once I wrap up this call?"

"Yes, of course."

Asung Group — the parent company of the Asung Giants Fox. And the group's pampered youngest daughter, an airheaded princess who'd been handed a professional ballclub as a toy.

That was the Director and team owner of Asung.