A Rising Star (4)

Busan Titans Cheer Director Jo Jeongmin—affectionately known to fans as 'Jjo-jang' because both his surname and given name began with the consonant 'J'—swallowed a bitter sigh. Having spent twenty-five years on the cheering podium, he was past forty and fast approaching the milestone of fifty, yet he had just watched Yoo Seonghyun pull off a magnificent defensive gem without getting to play the boy's fight song.

Seonghyun was no ordinary rookie prospect; he was a phenomenon who had seemingly materialized out of thin air. Following his scorching performance in the preseason exhibition games, his promotion to the active first-team roster had become a foregone conclusion. The front office had immediately requested a dedicated cheer routine, and Jjo-jang had poured his heart and soul into composing and choreographing it over the past two months.

To preserve the surprise for today's grand unveiling, he hadn't even uploaded a preview to YouTube. He had deliberately saved every note for Seonghyun's very first regular-season plate appearance. And yet, this was how it began—the entire stadium chanting the boy's three-syllable name in chaotic, uncoordinated shouts. As a director, nothing stung quite like a missed cue.

Well, I'll definitely get to play it during his first trip to the plate, right?

Bottom of the first inning, Titans on offense.

As leadoff hitter Choi Junhyung stepped into the right-hand batter's box, the capacity crowd packing Sajik Baseball Stadium belted out the chorus to his walk-up track in unison: Baha Men's "Who Let the Dogs Out."

Over twenty thousand voices roared the barking refrain at the top of their lungs: "Who! Who! Who! Who!"

It was undeniably infectious.

"Who! Who! Who!"

Right beside me in the dugout, Kang Hyuk-hyung got swept up in the rhythm, barking along with genuine enthusiasm. I gave him a flat look. Was this guy for real?

"Hyung, what's our approach against Smith?"

"Uh... right. Don't miss the fastball he uses to get ahead in the count?"

"And if you foul off a pitch and fall behind 0-2, what do you look out for?"

"The kick changeup?"

"Correct. You pass."

Crack!

An ominous metallic snap echoed across the diamond as Junhyung's sliced contact sailed harmlessly over the third-base dugout into the stands. A foul ball, but at least he hadn't rolled over into ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a first-pitch groundout. Count: 0-1. As expected, Smith opened with the four-seamer.

It was a standard heater—147 km/h at 2,000 RPM. Early in the game, starting pitchers naturally needed time to dial in their release point. Unless facing high leverage or the teeth of the opposing order, aces rarely emptied the tank from the opening frame.

With the first pitch out of the way, Junhyung's fight song erupted from the stands.

"In-vin-ci-ble Bu-san! Choi Junhyung~ Base hit! Choi Junhyung~ Base hit! Choi Junhyung~ Oh-oh-oh~"

Smith worked with remarkable tempo. I had read his past interviews; he was the type of pitcher who simply threw whatever his catcher signaled without second-guessing. After a remarkably brief interval, pitch two zipped straight into the catcher's mitt.

Thwack!

"Strike!" the umpire barked.

A 145 km/h, 1,800 RPM two-seamer darted down and away from the left-handed batter, painting the outermost fringe of the Automated Ball-Strike zone. Even with elite bat control, offering at that pitch was borderline impossible. Junhyung's jaw tightened. He was completely cornered.

This was precisely why jumping on a hittable first pitch was so vital.

Crack!

Smith pulled the string on his signature kick changeup. To Junhyung's credit, his bat control was sharp enough that he threw his hands out and made contact, but the tumbling spin produced a weak, dribbling ground ball.

The ball rolled sluggishly down the third-base line, straight toward the bag. Ordinarily, it would have been a routine out, but Junhyung possessed elite sprint speed—among the fastest on the entire roster—and made it a religion to sprint through first base at maximum effort on every single contact.

Rangers third baseman Kim Dojun reacted with lightning reflexes. Charging hard, he barehanded the rolling ball on the run and unleashed a sidearm whip across the diamond. It was going to be razor-thin.

"...Safe!"

Junhyung beamed as he dusted himself off on first, and the Sajik faithful cranked the volume of their chants even louder. Having already squandered one of their two video replay challenges earlier in the top half, the Rangers dugout refrained from reviewing the call.

Alright, time to get loose.

I stepped out of the dugout, slipped a weighted donut ring onto my bat, and took measured practice swings in the on-deck circle as Luis's walk-up music began to pulse through the stadium speakers.

With Luis stepping into the box, Smith threw over to first base, clearly wary of Junhyung's ten stolen bases on the year.

"MA!!"

"MA!!"

The home crowd roared the classic Busan pickoff taunt with sheer delight. The atmosphere was electrifying. Unfortunately, from my vantage point in the on-deck circle, the stadium wall blocked my view of my parents, my in-laws, Eunha, and little Harin. At least I had managed to wave to them during the side change.

Crack!

Smith opened Luis with a backdoor sweeper. It broke low and outside, tumbling well beneath the knees—yet like the quintessential bad-ball hitter he was, Luis whipped his bat through the zone anyway. Offering at that pitch was ridiculous; by all conventional metrics, it was pure garbage buried in the dirt.

And yet, he somehow turned it into a base hit. Using raw hand-eye coordination, Luis deftly pushed the pitch through the 5-6 hole between third and short. Kim Dojun laid out horizontally, but the ball skipped just beyond his reach. Powered by Luis's massive frame, the exit velocity had been blistering.

Still, was it truly an uncatchable ball? Not necessarily. Had Dojun secured it, an out was virtually guaranteed, even if a double play would have been difficult given Junhyung's head start.

Actually, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠wait. Luis isn't exactly fleet of foot before he gets up to speed, so it might have turned into two outs after all.

A premier big-league defender like José Ramírez would have gloved it in his sleep, but this was the KBO. In pure bat-to-ball skill on pitches out of the zone, Luis was superior even to me. My fundamental hitting philosophy was simple: swing at strikes, spit on balls. Having the visual acuity to track seams made that disciplined approach possible, but watching someone willingly golf a pitch buried in the dirt into left field never ceased to amaze me.

Calling that pitch a backdoor sweeper was generous anyway. It was just a hanging piece of junk.

Regardless, it was my turn. My walk-up track began reverberating across the bowl of Sajik.

The cheerful whistle intro of OneRepublic's "I Ain't Worried" drifted over the diamond. Following the rhythm, I whistled right along as I strolled toward the left-hand batter's box. Because walk-up clips had to be concise, the song quickly swelled into its soaring chorus.

It was a touch subdued for a traditional walk-up theme, but Eunha had chosen it for me, and that was all that mattered.

"Hey, kid. What's with the whistling? Shut your mouth and get in the box."

The Rangers catcher glared up at me. Seriously, do catchers in this league just have a vendetta against developmental signees? Why does everyone feel the need to start something?

Standing in the left-handed box against a right-handed pitcher, one thought was immediately clear: tracking the ball was infinitely easier from the opposite side.

Back in my previous life as a right-handed slugger, facing righty hurlers with deceptive mechanics was an uphill battle. The window to read pitch spin out of the hand was razor-thin. Now, with an unobstructed view of the release point, that handicap had vanished completely.

On the mound, Smith shook his head once more, his jaw firmly set. His objective was obvious: keep the ball down. The ideal outcome for him was hitting the low-and-away corner, coaxing a weak rollover into an inning-ending 5-4-3 twin kill.

If he wanted to go upstairs, he needed to miss high enough that my bat couldn't catch the plane. Missing by even an inch in the upper quadrant was an invitation to a souvenir.

So, what's it going to be? Fastball? Backdoor sweeper? Or the kick changeup?

According to my preseason sabermetric tracking, my batting average against fastballs hovered well above .500, with an in-zone contact rate exceeding ninety percent. Smith was known for establishing his fastball on pitch one, and with two runners aboard, no starter in his right mind would take it easy.

Yet Smith kept shaking off his catcher. His backstop was likely calling for another backdoor sweeper, reasoning that Luis's single had simply been freakish bad-ball hitting rather than poor pitch design. A catcher would naturally want to see another sweeper to gauge whether the breaking ball had its usual snap.

A pitcher, however, always knew best when a specific pitch lacked feel. Smith must have recognized that his sweeper was flat today, which was why he was refusing to throw it.

At the same time, the Rangers' scouting report would clearly state that I demolished fastballs and rarely, if ever, chased breaking balls in the dirt. Unless their analytics department had been asleep at the wheel, that tendency was glaringly obvious.

Falling behind in the count was out of the question with Hwang Jaehun looming on deck. Smith needed a strike, yet he was staring down a hitter who hunted heaters.

The catcher likely wanted to steal an easy strike or induce weak rollover contact with that backdoor sweeper. At least, that was my deduction, pieced together from sabermetric patterns and accumulated game data.

Of course, baseball had a habit of laughing at statistical deductions. There was always the chance Smith would simply say to hell with it and blow a four-seamer right down the pipe. Overanalyzing was a trap. In the end, the only thing that truly mattered was meeting the sweet spot of the bat to the center of the ball.

Smith finally gave a firm nod. He came set. Synchronizing my internal tempo with his delivery, I held my breath, locking my eyes onto his release point as every muscle in my body coiled with kinetic energy.

His arm whipped through.

Low RPM. A changeup.

Except... it was breaking right at chest level.

He left a changeup in the strike zone?!

The entire purpose of an off-speed pitch was deception. Slower than a heater, with far less spin, a changeup transformed into an absolute meatball the instant a hitter squared it up inside the zone. It was a pitch meant to dive out of the strike zone and into the dirt, not hang over the plate.

And he had left it floating right in my wheelhouse—not even painted on the outer black, but drifting over the inner-half.

You just served up batting practice.

My lower half uncorked with violent precision.

CRACK!

Wait... what about my cheer song?!

Up on the cheering stage, Jjo-jang, Jo Jeongmin, stood frozen with his hand hovering over the soundboard. Before he could even cue the backing track he had slaved over for two months, the ball had already disappeared into the summer sky.

Throwing his arms up in surrender, he tossed the cue sheet aside and screamed at the top of his lungs, joining twenty-five thousand ecstatic fans. He would just have to bite the bullet and play the song during the kid's next plate appearance.

"YOO! SEONG! HYUN! YOO! SEONG! HYUN!"