154. The Avengers (Part 1)
The second game of the series against Gwangju ended, of all things, with Jeong In-young getting the last laugh.
"Ahh, today I was perfect. Shame we couldn't take the win, but still..."
"Is it just me, or is this bastard basically a carbon copy of his brother? Petty to a degree that's honestly impressive."
So mused Song Jin-wook, who had a pretty good idea by now why he kept getting his backside kicked — and perhaps everyone really had walked away from that day's rally having gained something: the confidence that we can come back from anything, any time.
The whole clubhouse was giddy, a troop of monkeys chirping 'Keep this rolling and we're golden!' And then—
"...Ah. So that shit applies to us too, huh?"
The mood did not last long. Happy endings, as they say, always come with a bitter aftertaste. The very next day, the Doubles got hammered with a comeback home run and walked off.
"...Why am I getting déjà vu from yesterday's comeback?"
Noh In-seong stared up at the trajectory of a ball climbing high into the night sky. Perhaps Gwangju really had learned something from watching the previous day's dramatic turnaround.
The scoreboard now read 11–10. Trailing by two in the bottom of the ninth, Jeong Him-chan had authored a walk-off — and with it, smashed the near-certain sweep the Doubles had been cradling like an egg.
"Took one right on the chin." It wasn't that Jeong Im-taek had gotten careless this time. He'd brought in his closer in a save situation; it was simply one of those days when the closer detonates.
"...Argh, damn it all." Kim Jin-hong had to swallow the first blown save of his season with a gloomy face. Days like this happen — and on days like this, you take your loss like a grown man. And so the Doubles had to trudge onward to Daegu.
The series against Daegu ended 2–1. The first game was decided by nothing more than the sheer weight class of the two starting pitchers. The Doubles' sixth starter, Kim Jeong-mook, had drawn Jo Il-yeong — the only man in Daegu's rotation capable of making the national team.
"I don't get it. Why do I blow up harder than the team does when we actually lose?"
"Tell me about it. I did manage a home run today, at least."
At that bizarre, long-ball-happy launcher of a ballpark, Kim Jeong-mook never could contain Daegu's lineup and went down in flames. Jo Il-yeong, by contrast, stood his ground and traded blows face-to-face — yes, he got tagged for home runs by the Noh–Song duo, but...
In the end he took his lumps right down to the final out, gritted through nine full innings, and walked off with the glory of the win.
"Tch. Fine. Whatever... at least we got their starter on the cheap." Such was the masterclass Jo Il-yeong had thrown — enough to make even Noh In-seong turn away with a sour face.
Even after surrendering the first game, Daegu remained, structurally, the more disadvantaged ballclub at home. In a slugfest, the balance tilted overwhelmingly in the Doubles' favor — after all, the visitors' lineup featured one openly abnormal freak and a supporting cast of moderately abnormal freaks swinging bats with murderous intent. The starting punch of Jackson and Noh In-seong landed a great deal harder than the opposition's number four and five starters ever could.
Seven innings, two runs for Jackson. Eight innings, one run for Noh In-seong. Noh In-seong had, for his part, decorated the second earned run of his season with a home run surrendered to Jong Min-soo.
"Ugh. Fine, I owe that guy one, so I'll let it slide. This time." Noh In-seong scowled at the sight of Jong Min-soo hopping around the base paths like a delighted kangaroo — but a win was a win.
As the Doubles made off with the series and began packing for home, the man responsible for In-seong's second earned run of the day came looking for him.
"Argh, these bastards just waltz in and rob us of two wins like it's their god-given right."
"If it stings that much, hyung, then go out there and hit like I do."
Jong Min-soo tossed out the jab with all the venom he could muster, but there was precious little force behind it. A curiously deflated face, for a man who'd just homered off the league's best starting pitcher.
"...So. Where do you figure you'll get traded to?"
"...Who knows? Word is there are about three teams in the running."
A franchise player about to swap uniforms for another club's colors has little reason for cheer. The blockbuster trade chip known as Jong Min-soo continued in a low voice, his face dark.
Daegu was currently preparing a full rebuild. The After Noh In-seong project demanded stockpiling prospects and pinching every last won of team money. Jong Min-soo, destined for free agency in the near future, was a half-season rental convertible into prospect capital — a trade chip, in other words.
"And since my salary runs hefty, moving me lowers the cap, too."
In this baseball world, drained of both romance and loyalty, he had been reduced to a 'piece' for someone else's championship run. Jong Min-soo forced down the foul taste and spoke.
"You do whatever the hell you want. I'll have to find a new team when I go overseas anyway..."
"Well, if you'd rather not go quietly, there are ways around it, you know."
He was, after all, a veteran with enough standing to whip his own fanbase into a frenzy — or to stall the front office's master plan by a full year. But—
"Ugh, how tacky. Better to leave one decent prospect behind on my way out, no?"
Somewhere along the line, Jong Min-soo had become a seven-year veteran who believed in leaving cleanly. Unlike the old days, when his antics managed to infuriate half the league, there was a great deal more on his shoulders now. Bitter was bitter; his own baseball life was his own baseball life. Either way — challenge for a trophy for half a year, then head overseas? Not a bad hand at all.
"You watch yourself out there. I'm coming for you."
"Oh, I'm sure you will. And if it looks like we're losing, I'll just pitch Games 1, 4, and 7 myself."
"You? Please. A man without a shred of loyalty to his own team, and he has the gall..."
The two men laughed, turned, and walked away. Their respective homes were waiting for them.
The Doubles closed out the Gwangju–Daegu road trip at 4–2, and their mercenary completed a successful debut. The good news: Jackson had turned in a quality start and acquitted himself respectably.
He was a pitch-to-contact starter. Not that he couldn't miss bats — his strikeouts simply didn't come from the breaking ball. One slider with modest movement but late, sharp velocity; one splitter that didn't dive far but hunted the bottom of the bat. The blueprint was plain to see: just miss the sweet spot, please.
And naturally, with a shortstop whose temperament was a car crash and a freshly imported rookie of a second baseman sprinting around like maniacs, the plan came together beautifully.
"YES! Defense sholid!"
"...Chase what? Are you calling me a bird?"
His broken Korean did, on occasion, invite some truly bizarre misunderstandings, but—
"Every now and then he does things even a birdbrain wouldn't do."
—it beat him earning beatings with his properly pronounced Korean. At the very least, a kick aimed at a smiling face was preferable to a properly delivered insult. Wasn't it?
Q. So what's the bad news, then?
A. What else? The next opponent.
Over the winter Stove League, they'd swallowed an enormous screwjob in broad daylight. And in the middle of it, the player who'd openly declared his unhappiness was pried away, returning via sign-and-trade with a starting pitcher attached. But that starter was old — and the draft picks they'd acquired were still years away from producing a single player.
"If you're serious about playing October baseball this year, wouldn't you need to flip those picks again?"
"...Son of a—"
The unlucky club that would have to re-convey its own hard-won draft picks to other teams before ever getting to use them: the Seoul Superstars were waiting, faces flushed scarlet.
"We... probably shouldn't let him throw too many innings, sir?"
"Hmm... I'm losing my mind here. Just be straight with me. The draft pick was the target all along, wasn't it?"
The player in question was not long removed from injury, hovering on the threshold of grizzled old age. Jeon In-soo had become a white elephant to be coddled and cherished — and the Superstars found themselves in a white elephant of a situation.
"If fall baseball is the goal, wouldn't it be wiser to manage him carefully to at least... a hundred innings or so?"
"No — the whole reason we held out and bought up players was because we want fall baseball!"
A dilemma. Trade again, you say? Easier said than done. Daegu and Busan will sell, if only to protect their salary caps and secure their futures. Busan simply won't start selling until the trade deadline.
"Those teams can't be helped. Only once they've truly got no future left will their fans ease off the torches."
Well — it was still better than their usual UFC-meets-WWE theatrics escalating into a genuine physical incident. But if things deteriorated that far before a sale, would the players really come cheap? Quite the opposite. The price only climbs.
"If they can't even recoup a fair price, the fans of both teams will be out for their heads."
There are limits, after all, to trading away every last prospect just to buy the present.
"And while that lunatic squats over there, our goal is October baseball."
The devil who'd do absolutely anything to win was holding the line over there. Losing to him every single time was humiliating enough — and the devil positively refused to sit still.
"Among the players, they keep balking whenever they have to face that guy. There's something psychologically wrong with..."
"I've even heard one of them nearly came down with the yips?"
"Wow. Then let's just have the pitchers take one for the team. 'That' is too much to ask."
Among catchers especially, a strange rumor had begun to circulate.
The primary cause was Noh In-seong; the transmission vector was the player-to-player messenger grapevine. Even in 2052, the old 'I heard somebody say' theory spread faster than scandal attached to a beloved actress. And with the internet mixed in, it traveled faster still.
"...So what you're telling me is, you don't want to intentionally hit him with a pitch."
"I only just made the first team this year, sir, and from what the other guys are saying, people who face him end up going to psychiatric wards."
The young catcher was willing to offer a polite refusal even at the cost of enduring his coach's glare.
"...Argh, I've heard those stories too, so I can't even call it nonsense."
Even Song Jin-soo, who'd wedged his backside halfway into the vacant catcher's throne via free agency, had ears. And the battery coach who'd recommended Song Jin-soo to fill the catching vacancy obviously did too. At this rate, the number of pitches deliberately aimed at Noh In-seong's body looked likely to shrink a little.
"...You really think that's going to work?"
"Try putting yourself in their cleats. You're not on our team, I've already torched you for ten stolen bases, and you've eaten my mouth on top of it. Would you throw at me?"
"Should I spread a few more around? To Han-sol hyung, Ji-hoon, and Ji-young?"
"...Good grief. This man's face is thicker than bank-vault steel."
Needless to say, the subtle — the very subtle — nudge from behind the scenes had been public opinion, manufactured by Noh In-seong through Jo In-soo.
"Scatter some of it online, too. Well, it's not even a lie. That bastard's eyes genuinely did roll back."
As a certain clown once put it — madness is like gravity. All it takes is a little push.
"Ahem. My sincerest apologies, Mr. Clown, sir. This Noh-mother... er, Noh In-seong simply never appreciated the greatness of science."
A madman committing mad acts with truly unhinged diligence — and doing it on his Monday day off, no less.
Not that leaving this lunatic unattended meant quietly accepting defeat. The Superstars, with nothing left but malice and vengeance, opened with a war in the press.
"Because of one violent little brat, countless people across this league are made to tremble."
So fumed the Superstars' new general manager, Jeong Jae-yoon, in rare fine temper.
"How much longer does the association intend to hold its tongue about the recurrence of these acts of violence? Is it not time for the league to step in?"
What they wanted was 'additional discipline' for a 'perpetrator of violence'.
You've all taken your lumps from him too! You all hate the bastard! So join hands with us!
A naked attempt at a nine-team alliance was the Superstars' play.
"He injured players in bench-clearing brawls in the past, and has shown not one shred of remorse!"
By their account, here was a player who, at the slightest provocation, marched out of the batter's box to menace opposing pitchers.
So declared 'one club', decrying how unfair it all was.
Ordinarily, this was precisely the kind of Always WWE episode where the association would happily drum along — Aaargh! It hurts so bad! — right on cue. But—
"Oh, is that so? Then before I get around to the other clubs, I'll just start tenderizing those bastards over there. Nice and slow."
After Noh In-seong's declaration of war hit the papers, the association went silent once more. With the eight clubs 'separated' from the Superstars, any motion for additional discipline was dead on arrival, and everyone knew it.
And if it's come to this... won't our series, right after the Superstars' games, just... not happen?
How far out does their Superstars schedule even run? I wonder when it's all going to blow up?
The other clubs were far too busy weighing their own losses against their own gains to stand in solidarity with anyone else's misfortune.
"Attaboy! Beat him harder!"
"Sell us immediate-impact players, not prospects! We need the prospects for our own rebuild!"
Meanwhile, teams like Daegu and Busan had begun — none too subtly — rooting for Noh In-seong.
The more wretched the Superstars get, the higher the price we can fetch for our players.
The more prospects the better! Cuts our rebuild time. Lovely!
Q. If the Superstars implode, won't they be forced to give up on October baseball entirely?
It wasn't that the question never came up.
But they each had a Plan B as well. Daegu's answer: A. 'No, whatever. We don't have to buy! Then we'll just take our shot ourselves.' Busan's answer: A. 'Eh, we're holding out until the trade deadline this year anyway, so we're fine!'
Daegu had genuine pedigree of its own; Busan, pessimistic about its future, would at least take its swing. If the Superstars wouldn't sell, Daegu would simply knock one more team out of its path — and if they did sell, they'd sell high. True merchants, the both of them.
"Th...that son of a bitch...!!"
Unsurprisingly, every last club declined the offer with a declaration of 'we simply cannot commit such unfair acts!' Having already fumbled the opening salvo of the media war, precious few options remained to the Superstars.
"...Then we'll simply have to pick a fight on a day Noh In-seong isn't playing."
The mercenaries they had, uniquely among the league, scouted and signed with deliberate care. Big bodies. Real strength. Genuinely good at baseball.
"...And rather good at other things, too."
Victor Emenike — All-American caliber, a collegiate wrestler on the side. Zeke 'GG' Jake Paul — an amateur boxer, right up until the day he landed his baseball scholarship.
To the Superstars, who had spent last year bottoming out at the foot of the standings after a bench-clearing beatdown that bordered on annihilation, an Anti-Noh In-seong Countermeasure had just landed in their laps.
"No matter how fast you run or how loud you rage, you're still just a baseball player."
What could a ballplayer possibly do against men who trained in combat sports for a living?
Jeong Jae-yoon now held in his hands the golden opportunity to repay every humiliation the Superstars had ever suffered.
"Until now, you see, we had only ever experienced violence by the standards of... amateurs!!"
Now, at last, they would face the genuine article — men who had elevated violence to the level of a fighting art.
For the first time in a very, very long while, Jeong Jae-yoon leaned back in his chair and let himself sink into it.
His heart was at ease.