You Must Respect Me
Gong Ji-hoo sank to the ground.
It was the top of the first inning.
The Rhinos fans could not hide their bewilderment at this completely unwelcome Children's Day surprise.
"Number two hitter Gong Ji-hoo! He casually produces a hit in his first at-bat! Of course Gong Ji-hoo reaches base again today! You simply cannot stop this player from getting on! Runners on first and second. Next batter is… Wait, what's going on?"
"Gong Ji-hoo, who just arrived at first base, is sitting right down on the spot."
"Hopefully it's not an injury."
"Could there have been a problem during his baserunning…"
"The replay doesn't show anything particularly wrong."
"His face is red. He might not have been feeling well even before the game started."
"Are you saying he played despite not being in good condition?"
"Manager Dong Sang-guk's player management is second to none, so it wouldn't have been the manager forcing him. He probably hid it and played anyway. It's a common mistake for young players—especially a young player who's become the center of the team."
"I see… Ah! Fortunately, Gong Ji-hoo is getting back up right away."
"Looks like it wasn't anything serious, thankfully. Still, managing your condition is important. The season is long, after all."
With the broadcast booth—which hadn't received any prior notice—piling on their commentary, the situation only grew more alarming.
Without you our team is doomed~
The Rhinos fans, who had almost forgotten how precious Gong Ji-hoo was from sheer familiarity, once again realized his value and prayed for his health.
Of course.
"Why'd you suddenly do that?"
"Because I was embarrassed…"
"What? This coach is having a hard time understanding you, Ji-hoo."
"I just had a really embarrassing at-bat."
"Fine, do whatever you want. You're not hurt, right?"
"Nope!"
Gong Ji-hoo, who had simply sat down out of pure mortification, was perfectly healthy.
The Rhinos' family-man veterans failed to capitalize on the scoring chance created by their solid young table-setter.
"No runs from first and second with nobody out…"
"Ahem."
Number three hitter Garcia struck out. The pitiful foreign worker (annual salary of 1.4 billion won) who supported his family back home with money earned in a faraway land had bragged in front of his long-unseen child that "Daddy actually makes money this easily."
Number four hitter Kang Ho-san and number five Song Han-su also failed to produce anything and were easily retired.
"Everyone's gripping the bat way too tight."
It was only natural, though. Their kids had come to watch the Children's Day series in person.
Even from Daegu all the way to Seoul. One foreign worker's family had come all the way from Venezuela to Korea. Such long distances.
Of course they wanted to win. And if they could become the hero of a victorious game, even better.
"As expected of Master Ji-hoo! When it comes to mental stuff, he knows better than anyone. Or maybe he's close with his dad so he understands a father's heart?"
"Uh…"
Well.
In other words.
"Han-su hyung! Do you really need to understand a father's heart to get that? Why are you acting like this when you should know better."
"R-right?"
"It's the defensive inning now, so DH hyung, stop bothering us and sit quietly on the bench. No moving around, okay? Got it?"
"Do you think I'm your daughter?"
"Hyung, are you crazy? How dare you compare yourself to my adorable daughter when you're almost forty."
Kang Ho-san draped an arm over Song Han-su's shoulder and guided him to the bench.
Wink.
Kang Ho-san turned back and winked at me.
Ah…
Come to think of it, the only Rhinos player who knew I was an orphan was Kang Ho-san.
It's not like I particularly care…
I'd been an orphan for far too long to get hurt by talk about parents.
If anything.
Having him be considerate like that bothers me more.
It just made me feel unnecessarily guilty. Maybe I should do an "orphan coming-out" when I have time later.
Anyway.
Today's game didn't look like it would be easy. With all the Rhinos' core hitters swinging for the fences like heroes, there was no way things would go smoothly.
"Hoo…"
What could you do? Games like this happened sometimes.
The game was quite intense.
Through the end of the fourth, the score remained 0-0. The early innings had the feel of a pitchers' duel. In other words.
The kind of game that kids who'd come to watch in person found the most boring was unfolding.
Come to think of it, I used to find pitchers' duels boring too.
I had a memory of going on a group outing from the orphanage when I was little. Around 2009, I think.
Baseball had exploded in nationwide popularity thanks to the Beijing Olympics, so even the kids at the orphanage caught the baseball fever, which naturally led to a group outing to a game.
So yeah, I was a "Beijing newbie" myself. Of course, neither then nor afterward did I have any real interest in baseball. The game I'd watched live had been ridiculously boring.
Was that one a pitchers' duel too?
Maybe that was part of why, when I started seriously walking the path of a baseball player in high school—as a shortstop-slash-outfielder-slash-pitcher—I decided to go the hitter's route. Of course.
"You throw like absolute garbage."
The catcher who'd been my dedicated ball-receiver saying that had a lot to do with it too.
Crack!!
The Jaguars batter took a half-hearted swing at the Rhinos starter's breaking ball, and the weakly hit ball rolled toward third.
Thud.
I fielded it naturally and, without missing a beat,
Thwack!!
threw it ordinarily to first. The first baseman caught it ordinarily as well, and we secured an ordinary ground-ball out.
There were certainly pitchers' duels that kids found fun to watch. But today's game seemed like the textbook example of a boring pitchers' duel.
Not a game where the pitcher racked up strikeouts with high-velocity heat, but one where he worked the innings by inducing contact.
How efficiently the pitcher was using his pitch count. How he was deceiving the batters. If you used your head, a game like this could be interesting too.
But well.
If kids were thinking about all that while watching the game, that would be even scarier.
Anyway, kids liked home runs and strikeouts. Of course, speaking as someone who had been nothing more than an ordinary guy with no particular heroics today, I could say I was one of the culprits behind this boring game.
For now, at least.
Top of the fifth.
My third at-bat.
Recalling the feel of my second at-bat, where I'd unfortunately flown out deep, I stepped into the box.
"Good work…"
Today my voice somehow got quieter whenever I stepped up to hit. Probably
"Good work, senior!"
because of the embarrassing memory from my first at-bat.
"…Yeah."
Thwack!!
The first pitch of a duel that proceeded without much conversation.
"Ball."
It had been a close one.
"Whoa… nice pitch."
Or maybe just lucky. Whether luck or skill, the pitcher had thrown it to a spot that drew admiration.
"Waaah! it is."
"What?"
I whipped my head around in shock to look at the catcher squatting behind the plate, but the catcher was just staring at me with sparkling eyes.
"I must've misheard?"
"I said 'Waaah!', senior!"
"Huh…"
My head throbbed.
"You must respect me I recorded .400 for two consecutive years in the Futures League and claimed the Korean Series MVP while earning a championship ring and set numerous records like five consecutive at-bat home runs and the fewest games to ten home runs…"
Ah.
"Fuck…"
"Aren't you going to continue?"
Kids these days, seriously.
Whoosh!!
I absolutely was not running away out of embarrassment.
Crack!!
A good pitch just came, so I swung.
The ball, which shot out as powerfully as my embarrassment was deep, slammed into the right-field wall.
Thud.
I easily took second base without even needing to slide.
"That was a truly amazing Waaah!, senior."
Ah, you too?
Kids these days were terrifying. I, who was past thirty if you counted the world only I remembered, was starting to find my so-called peers utterly frightening.
Ruthlessly digging into a senior's embarrassing past. How very MZ of them.
"Ahem."
I cleared my throat for no reason and forced myself to focus on the game.
Still in the box was the Venezuelan windmill, still swinging for the fences. You'd think getting struck out in his second at-bat would have woken him up.
Tch…
But then.
Are our MZ guys treating me like I don't exist?
Throwing a slow breaking ball to fool the batter? Of course that was fine.
Especially when the guy in the box was full of desire to become a hero and swinging wildly. Even more so.
But.
He's windmilling up…?
The windup crossed the line.
I, Gong Ji-hoo, was probably the most analyzed hitter in the KBO right now. I was putting up numbers that could reasonably call me the best hitter of the season.
The fact that I didn't like stealing bases was something every team should know by now.
But.
"Gong Ji-hoo doesn't steal bases" and
"There's no need to pay attention when Gong Ji-hoo is on base"
were slightly different stories.
Of course.
I had never attempted a steal even once so far, but my speed was by no means bad. It was above average, if anything.
The only reason I didn't steal was that even the greatest base-stealers couldn't succeed 100% of the time, and the hitters behind me were power hitters who didn't need me to steal anyway.
So.
This looks way too delicious…
In a situation that practically begged "Please steal," even I wanted to go for it.
Is he crazy?
I hesitated for a moment, but there was no sign of that. Just.
With a runner on second, and that runner being me—the guy who absolutely never steals—they'd let their guard down.
Tap-tap-tap.
Letting your guard down was fatal.
The moment I saw the pitcher go into his windup, I took off for third.
"Third!"
The startled calls from the Jaguars players. But.
Garcia's hero swing had unintentionally delayed the catcher's decision, and the catcher who'd been complacent thinking I would never steal was so flustered by the sudden situation that he couldn't even throw the ball.
Slide.
"Safe!"
A steal of third.
-Waaaaaah!!
Having succeeded in a steal that sent the kid fans into a frenzy, I shrugged my shoulders toward Garcia in the batter's box.
Even without a big hit, you could still become a hero.
With the core of the lineup snapping out of it and stringing together hits, the Rhinos took a three-run lead and held that distance through the bottom of the ninth.
And then.
Thwack!!
"Strike!"
Thwack!!!
"Strike!"
Thwack!!
"Strikeout!"
A pitcher throwing mid-to-high 160 km/h heat and
-Waaaaaaaaah!!!
the crowd going absolutely wild. Watching that, I
"Life, man…"
felt the emptiness of a reality where some people had to run their asses off just to get the fans to cheer, while others could draw this kind of roar just by casually throwing a ball.
The first game of the Children's Day series, which had lifted the spirits of Oh Jin-muk, who'd been depressed over his extremely limited playing time.
Maybe I got to pitch because Ji-hoo didn't hit any home runs.
Oh Jin-muk finished the game with a three-up, three-down inning while secretly hoping Gong Ji-hoo would hit a few fewer home runs.
And then.
I never wished for it to go this far…
Having shaken off his depression, Oh Jin-muk was now feeling guilty.