Exhibition Game (Part 3)
"That's my papi! What a gorgeous swing!"
Luis greeted me with open arms as I rounded first, second, and third before touching home plate. Choi Junhyung looked a bit hesitant, still wary of stepping on toes, but offered his congratulations as a teammate nonetheless.
"Um, great home run."
"Thank you," I replied politely. Since no one on the roster was younger than me, speaking with formal respect was second nature.
"Hurry up and clear the box so we can actually play baseball," a surly voice grumbled behind me.
The Daegu Knights catcher was an absolute eyesore every time I looked at him. Cursing at me earlier just because I didn't return a greeting was one thing, but now he was taking subtle digs at me at home plate. Life would be so much simpler if people just focused on playing baseball.
"Damn, kid, that swing was filthy," Jaehoon-hyung praised as I neared the on-deck circle.
"Thanks, Jaehoon-hyung."
"Just you wait right there. I'm hitting one out of here too."
"Go get 'em."
After wrapping up the quick exchange with Jaehoon-hyung, who was loosening his shoulders with dry swings, I paused by Kanghyuk-hyung and whispered some advice: just ignore the catcher if the guy tried to get in his head.
When I stepped into the dugout, silence fell over the bench. Not a single person acknowledged me. The classic silent treatment—a time-honored rookie prank for hitting your first home run. Pretty cute.
The moment I smirked and took a seat, the manager and the entire roster erupted into cheers and applause. Alberto and Lucas clapped louder than anyone.
"Damn it, this won't do," Lucas muttered in English, shaking his head. "I'll pay out of my own pocket if I have to. Get this guy to the Phillies right now and get rid of that bust occupying third base."
"Lucas, what did you just say?" the interpreter asked, caught off guard.
"Shit."
Lucas was dead serious about shipping me off to Philadelphia, while the interpreter and hitting coach Michael chuckled in disbelief. Having spent twenty years with the Phillies in my previous life, I knew Lucas's reaction was one hundred percent authentic.
Eunha's watching this, right?
Spotting the club's in-house media camera inching toward me, I stared into the lens with a deadpan expression and gave a flat thumbs-up.
"Uh... is that it?" the media staffer asked, taken aback.
"It's just an exhibition game," I said evenly. "When I hit one out in June, I'll give you a proper celebration."
"Ah... right..."
Out on the mound, Justin was already flushed beet-red with rage after coughing up three runs in the opening frame on a walk, a base hit, and a three-run blast. That was always the vulnerability with pitchers like him—wearing their temper on their sleeve for everyone in the park to read.
Before the first inning was even halfway done, the Knights' pitching coach, interpreter, and catcher all jogged out to the mound for an emergency conference. Part of me hoped he wouldn't find his command before my next at-bat.
"All right! Let's take it one pitch at a time!"
Jaehoon-hyung stepped up to the plate, full of bravado after boasting he would match my homer. He turned on a first-pitch four-seamer running high and tight, pulling it with venom, but the ball drifted foul by a narrow margin. The exit velocity had been scorching; had it stayed fair, it would have ripped right through the third baseman for extra bases. Tough break.
On the second pitch, a two-seamer drifted toward the outside edge before sinking late, nicking the bottom corner of the zone. Strike two.
Man, talk about rotten luck.
Checking the pitch-tracking display on the dugout tablet, the ball had caught the absolute thinnest sliver of the boundary. He had fallen victim to the infamous mechanical strike zone's robotic rigidity. Hitting a pitch out there was virtually impossible to drive with authority; fouling it off to stay alive was the only viable move. Judging by those two pitches, Justin was gradually locking in his release point.
Still, having tablet access right here in the dugout was remarkably convenient. This was Jaehoon-hyung's seventh career matchup against Justin. His record stood at two hits in six at-bats with one RBI—a small sample size that offered little predictive value.
Crack!
Justin came back with a four-seamer to the same location. It was slightly further outside than the previous pitch and technically out of the zone, but the batter had no choice but to commit. With that earlier sinking two-seamer called a strike in nearly the exact same trajectory, Jaehoon-hyung had to protect the plate.
Justin certainly looked the part of an arm with Major League experience. The quality of his traditional four-seamer paired with a subtly deceptive cut on his movement profiles was undeniably sharp. If he managed to mix in a reliable slider, he would be a nightmare to handle.
This was my first exposure to the KBO's Automated Ball-Strike system in live play, but having calibrated against it on the Traject Arc simulator, it felt noticeably taller and narrower east-to-west compared to what I remembered from the majors.
In every respect, that zone played directly into my hands. If outside strikes weren't going to be called, there was zero reason to chase them.
The Torpedo Bat I swung had its barrel weight concentrated slightly thicker toward the sweet spot, making it difficult to generate pure barrel contact on pitches drifting off the outer black. But if the horizontal margins were this tight, I could simply spit on anything outside without consequence.
Clack!
This time, Justin's curveball disrupted Jaehoon-hyung's timing entirely. He topped the ball above the center axis, sending a weak grounder trickling toward the infield dirt. The shortstop scooped it cleanly and fired across the diamond to first. One out.
Before retreating to the dugout, Jaehoon-hyung exchanged a quick word with Kanghyuk-hyung on the on-deck circle. Kanghyuk-hyung then made his way toward the batter's box.
If only the man's defense were halfway respectable, he would be an indispensable everyday player. Looking across our first-team lineup, only a couple of hitters possessed raw batting tools comparable to Kanghyuk-hyung's. The rest of the roster lagged behind him at the plate—excluding Jaehoon-hyung and Luis, of course.
Kanghyuk-hyung took a deep, steadying breath and dug his cleats into the dirt. I watched intently from the dugout rail.
"Whoa?!"
"Ball!"
A high, tight cutter buzzed his chest, forcing him to bail out awkwardly.
...Another brushback just because nobody bowed to your catcher?
This was turning into a pattern, which meant my next trip to the plate could get dicey. Justin had clearly found his command now, so missing inside by that much wasn't an accident. But then again, you had to see how a pitcher followed up an inside heater before you could declare it deliberate intent.
"Strike!"
A four-seamer painted the outside edge, clipping the corner of the zone with pinpoint precision. After seeing a cutter bore in on his ribs, that outside fastball must have looked miles away.
"Strike two!"
Pitch three dropped in as an outside curve. Kanghyuk-hyung flinched, holding his swing in check as the umpire signaled strike two. Justin's changeup control had deserted him earlier, so he was leaning on the hook to compensate. The count sat at 1-2. Pitcher's count.
If I'm on the mound, I bury a changeup down and away right here. Mimic that outside fastball's release, then let the bottom fall out. Nobody lays off that.
"Ugh!"
Crack...
Right on cue, Kanghyuk-hyung took the bait, reaching for a fading changeup tumbling beneath the outside corner. The ball died off the end of his bat, bouncing softly into the infield grass just like the dribbler I had charged earlier.
The third baseman reacted instantly, charging in to barehand the chopper before uncorking a throw to first. It was a bang-bang play.
"...Out!"
The call went against us. Kanghyuk-hyung hung his head, shoulders slumped as he trudged back to the dugout.
"Man... was that a changeup?"
"Yeah," I answered. "What were you sitting on?"
"I was expecting him to blow a heater by me."
"Makes sense. After seeing that slow curve, the perceived velocity jump on a four-seamer would've looked like lightning. Justin's locked in now. It won't be easy to square him up."
Just as I predicted, the subsequent hitter rolled over for an easy out, bringing an end to the frame. Time to grab my glove. Ugh, playing defense is such a chore...
Lucas started the next half-inning by surrendering a leadoff double to Daegu's cleanup hitter. He had leaned far too heavily on four-seamers against the top three spots in the order, and the fourth hitter had pounced on a first-pitch fastball with veteran poise.
Watching Lucas's expression sour on the mound, I cupped my hands around my mouth and hollered across the diamond.
"Hey, Lucas! If you lose your composure and start spraying walks here, you're never seeing Citizens Bank Park again! You hear me?!"
"...I know, Yoo!" Lucas shouted back, scowling. "Shut your mouth and watch me punch out the next three!"
Behind the plate, our thirty-six-year-old veteran catcher immediately caught on to Daegu's aggressive fastball hunting. He wasted no time shifting the pitch sequencing toward secondary breaking stuff.
Despite the leadoff double, Lucas escaped unscathed, racking up a routine flyout, a grounder, and a swinging strikeout to strand the runner. Not a single ball was hit toward the hot corner. An absolute blessing.
Having located his release point, Justin began carving up our order, demonstrating exactly how he had survived three seasons in the KBO as a foreign starter. Lucas responded in kind, overwhelming opposing bats with his imposing frame and raw velocity now that Daegu was seeing him for the first time.
The game swiftly settled into a crisp, high-level pitchers' duel. Given exhibition pitch count limits, however, both starters were likely capped around fifty to sixty pitches. By my calculation, I would squeeze in one more look at Justin before they pulled him.
The scoreboard remained locked at 3-0 thanks to my first-inning blast. Bottom of the third.
Choi Junhyung led off the frame, taking a clean, aggressive swing on a first-pitch strike and driving it on a line. Unfortunately, it flew straight into the third baseman's waiting glove for a lineout. A hard-hit out on the very first pitch was frustrating, but you couldn't fault the approach. Smacking the ball on the screws straight into a glove was just bad luck.
Luis followed, grinding through a gritty, deep at-bat before tapping out on a weak grounder. Two outs, bases empty.
"Yoo Seonghyun! Yoo Seonghyun! Yoo Seonghyun!"
I was just a developmental player without a walk-up song or an official team cheer, but that first-inning blast had won over the weekday crowd. Their voices echoed across the stadium, chanting my name in unison.
Come to think of it, what walk-up music should I pick? I'll have Eunha choose something for me.
Clap-clap-clap-clap-clap! Yoo Seonghyun, base hit! Clap-clap-clap-clap-clap! Yoo Seonghyun, base hit!
A generic, standard-issue stadium chant filled the air. I made a mental note to ask the front office for a proper, stylish cheer song once I made the roster.
"Back for more, kid?" the catcher spat as I stepped into the box. "It won't be like last time. Take your strikeout like a good boy and walk back to your dugout."
"..."
I paid him zero mind. Why was a grown man acting so desperate for attention? He was older than my physical body by a mile, yet he couldn't stop flapping his gums.
Justin came set and fired his first pitch—a sharp cutter boring straight toward my ribs, just like the one he had thrown Kanghyuk-hyung. If I hadn't wrenched my torso backward, it would have cracked me flush on the ribs.
"Ugh!"
"...Ball!"
I narrowed my eyes. It felt intentional, but recalling Kanghyuk-hyung's sequence, the standard pattern called for an outside pitch next.
Then Justin released the second pitch—and the white sphere hurtled straight toward my head.
Ah, fuck this. I told you I just wanted to play baseball.
CRACK!
I jerked my chin aside at the final microsecond, angling my head so the projectile struck the crown of my helmet rather than my jaw. The ball arrived high, deflecting off the reinforced plastic with a hollow, violent crack before carousing into the backstop netting. The force ripped the helmet clean off my skull, sending it tumbling into the dirt.
For a fleeting second, the urge to stage an all-out Major League brawl surged through my veins. But knowing Eunha was watching the broadcast at home, I clamped down on the fury threatening to boil over.
Even so, professional boundaries had to be drawn.
"Get the fuck off the field! You fucking blind dumbass! Does this helmet look like a strike zone to you?!"
I jabbed my index finger squarely at Justin's chest, then swung my arm outward in an unmistakable, exaggerated ejection gesture.
The pitch had been hard velocity—fastball velocity, whether a straight four-seamer or a hard cutter, though turning my head away had obscured the spin. KBO regulations were crystal clear: any direct headshot from a fastball variant triggered an immediate, non-negotiable ejection.
Seeing my mocking ejection gesture, Justin's face flushed crimson. He charged off the mound toward home plate, bellowing furiously, and within seconds, both dugouts emptied as players, coaches, and managers spilled onto the field in a surging sea of jerseys.