The Knuckle Curve (2)

As May gave way to June, the Seoul Twins — whose results had been sliding steadily downward compared to their early-season form — were hit with the news that Kim Yi-seon and Kang Min-hyuk were being sent down to the minors.

The manager insisted, to the very end, that it was merely a temporary demotion to rest players who were still so young. But who was going to stop baseball fans from running the misery circuit?

As if that weren't enough, Kang Hyun-seok — whose skills had fallen well short of his prime but who had still quietly done his job on the Twins' mound — was shut down with muscle fatigue all on top of it.

So when Kim Yi-seon and Kang Min-hyuk were optioned down, the community reaction was pure, unadulterated chaos.

First and foremost, the Seoul Twins' fans were on the verge of losing their minds. It was obvious that the team's May surge had been powered above all by the starting rotation.

In the major team offensive categories — runs scored, team OPS — the Seoul Twins sat stubbornly in the bottom tier of the league. Their wins had been stacked up by the starters' outstanding ability to keep runs off the board, and by a Twins defense that, unlike their hitting, was quietly respectable.

Of course, it wasn't as if the pitchers themselves had been perfect. When Kang Hyun-seok and the veterans struggled, the rookies had carried the team to victory with enormous performances; when the rookies wobbled in late May, the veterans picked up the slack and kept the momentum alive — a perfectly symbiotic relationship in which each side filled the other's gaps.

And now Kim Yi-seon, Kang Min-hyuk, and even Kang Hyun-seok were supposedly not what they used to be, and were resting in the minors? It wasn't the tail end of the season when fatigue would be expected — it was still June?

The brief reign atop the division was yanked away almost immediately, and they now sat in third place. Autumn baseball was still within sight, but if things kept flowing like this, forget October — they were headed for another last-place finish and the first overall pick.

Someone quipped, "Well, they filled the rotation with two first-rounders, so if they use the first overall pick on a reliever and a position player, they should win it all the year after next." As if that were going to happen. A joke, obviously.

Worse still, fans of other teams were chiming in — half worry, half complaint — suggesting that the Seoul Twins, with their weak roster and their impatience, had burned these future stars too early and possibly done real damage to their development.

With the entire world frozen by COVID-19, the KBO was the only league still running, and domestic and international attention was fixed on it. If the Seoul Twins' image hardened into something ugly at a moment like this, the roasting that would follow was beyond imagining.

And so, while everyone chewed their nails and watched the situation unfold—

—the news of Kim Yi-seon's return arrived.

"Good. And your condition?"

"Perfect, sir."

I answered with all the confidence I could muster at the sight of the manager's faintly worried face. I was coming up for a start after more than two weeks away, so from where he stood, worrying made sense.

It hadn't been planned on this scale at first. The idea had simply been to pitch at the major-league level while mulling things over — and somehow I'd skipped three turns in the rotation.

The manager had said, since we'd come this far, I might as well rest in the minors and polish things properly. With the re-up taking at least two weeks, I'd spent all three of those starting opportunities doing nothing but mastering the knuckle curve.

Thanks to that, my body wasn't just perfect — it was in the best shape of my life.

"Good. Confidence suits you. By the way — I hear you built your battery with Min-soo again this time. Should I just make him your personal catcher?"

"No need to go that far, sir."

And needless to say, that mastery process — and keeping my condition sharp — had taken a truly staggering amount of help.

Ye-eun and Min-ah, as always, took care of my daily life, and Seo-hee ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was pouring everything into the club's operations, so you could argue they held the largest share of the credit. Anyway. That's how it is.

After the women of my life, with their overwhelming contribution percentage, the two humans who came next in usefulness would have to be—

"Rookie, how many times do I have to say it? Erase from your brain the grips and know-how of guys with hands the size of a dick!"

"For a knuckle curve, that early pressure angle is barely any different from a normal curve."

—Walker and Min-soo sunbae.

Walker had stared at my grip and my hand movement like a man possessed, clawing at me to explain, but when it came to the knuckle curve, he flat-out refused to let me keep anything — every grip, every tip I'd ever known — demanding I wipe it all from my head.

"Your hand's got to be a solid nine inches. Why are you grabbing a grip meant for people with baby-dick hands? To take your fingertips completely out of the spin and lock in the rotation axis, you've got to set your index finger more like—!"

"You don't have to force the palm into it! What do you think those Black guys' fingers — longer than a dick — are even for?"

Hmm... the wording left quite a lot to be desired, but the advice itself was genuinely good.

My hands were, without exaggeration, large even among baseball players, let alone ordinary people. Nobody had ever really centered their coaching on that fact, so I hadn't realized it, but Walker had spent his life around plenty of big-handed guys, and he knew grips built for them like the back of his hand.

Thanks to him, a knuckle curve with a grip unlike anyone else's had been born.

And then there was Min-soo sunbae.

"According to what the coaches worked out, for now your curve targets the lower outside corner — a chase pitch and count-filler that lives on the border between the strike zone and ball four. But from a catcher's point of view, if you'd target counts a little more aggressively, the linkage with your fastball trajectory would—"

He gave me a coldly precise analysis of the pitch from the receiving side, the hitting side — the perspectives you simply can't feel from the throwing side. The coaches and Director Jo helped with this too, of course, but a real player's lived perception was always going to be the most accurate.

Beyond them, the coaching staff, the data engineers of the scouting and analysis team, my personal instructor Director Jo — the experts were a massive help. Apparently there was a reason the Seoul Twins had a reputation for developing pitchers.

Fine adjustments to the spin axis and seam orientation. How to integrate an entirely new pitch into my existing delivery with minimal disruption. How to minimize the discomfort that cropped up anyway. Tips for command. Tuning location and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠control.

For two full weeks, I drilled every one of those granular details with total focus.

"There we go. You've officially climbed out of Little League. Still junior-high level, mind you."

"At this point... the framework's solid, right? The fine details still need work."

"Master a brand-new pitch in two weeks? That's not a human being. That's an alien."

"Director Jo, Kang Min-hyuk did it."

"Which is exactly why I keep telling you that kid IS an alien."

Even so, it was all still fairly rough around the edges.

The Gwangju Phoenix had stumbled through one of those seasons where, before a single game was played, the drama was already endless.

First, Park Dong-min — the Phoenix's homegrown ace — had gone down with a Tommy John injury at the Premier 12, ending his season entirely. The silver lining was a sabbatical year that would let him return properly next season, but losing your homegrown ace was a massive blow to the roster.

On top of that, they'd suffered unavoidable departures in internal free agency, and outside of baseball itself, several of their prospects had landed in hot water over personal scandals — one flat tire after another.

Still, they had reclaimed first place.

Manager Ju Seok-in of the Gwangju Phoenix, weighing all of the above, did not consider this a crisis. Underdogs causing early-season upsets was simply a law of nature that repeated every year.

Every team had a stretch where its starters went momentarily superhuman, didn't they? But that was where it ended. A truly strong team drew its strength from its squad depth. Weren't the Seoul Twins themselves barely rattled, even with three homegrown starters sent to the minors?

And pitchers coming back rusty from a minor-league stint went without saying. Kim Yi-seon and Kang Min-hyuk in particular weren't just fresh out of high school — even after being sent down, they hadn't made a single minor-league appearance, devoting themselves purely to rest.

Charitably interpreted, they'd been rookies who rushed to raise their bodies to professional level, burned out fast, and ran the tank dry. In the worst case, they might have lost their own rhythm and mentality after a handful of major-league starts and fallen into a full-blown slump.

Even if they'd clawed partway out of that hole, the aftershocks would linger. That was simply how it worked. So he wasn't afraid — not really.

"So don't go getting spooked by a couple of kids. Count their rice bowls and count ours — we've eaten plenty more of them. You think fear's going to feed you?"

"Yes, sir!"

And with that, he broadcast the sentiment straight to his ballclub. Cracking wise as he did it was veteran national-team outfielder Park Hyung-wook.

"Yi-seon and me, we go way back from the national team, all right? He's gonna come out all sweet and respectful — 'Oh, sunbaenim is here!' — and groove one right down the middle."

"Aw, come on, hyung. I heard the real stories. Apparently that kid barely talks to anyone unless they're Hyunseok-hyung-tier or Hyuk-hyung and Yeonjun-hyung level — or Si-hwan before he went to the States. Isn't he the crown prince of the next national team generation?"

"Tch. I'm the crown prince of the previous generation, thanks."

"What prince, hyung? You were Dolsoe."

The position players who'd already crossed bats with Kim Yi-seon on the national team swapped stories in an easygoing drawl, and not a single one of them looked particularly nervous.

Of course, Kim Yi-seon's pitching was extraordinary. The memory of the Japanese national team laying not so much as a glove on his pitches was still vivid.

But did that mean they'd lose?

No. Absolutely not. Not out of bravado, not out of confidence theater — they simply believed it as a matter of course. That was the true strength of the defending champions, a team that knew how to win. A winning mentality.

Manager Ju Seok-in watched his ballclub react exactly the way he'd hoped, and a satisfied smile crept across his face.

"Good. Then tomorrow, same as always — show the Gwangju fans the baseball they've come to expect from us. Understood?"

"Yes, sir!"

June, deep in the grip of summer, and obscenely hot. Global warming, apparently, spared no one.

Gwangju wasn't at Daegu's famous levels of heat, but it was a major city sitting on the southern edge of the peninsula, and the heat here was miserable in its own right. The clubhouse had the air conditioning running full blast for the players' sake, but step out that door and the muggy air made breathing itself a chore.

Playing baseball in this weather, it was no wonder certain players and teams fell apart every summer. And by rotten luck, broadcast scheduling had slotted this one as a day game instead of a night game, which made it that much crueler.

I was still mid-thought when a knock came at the door.

"Yi-seon. Time to head out."

The pitching coach. I glanced at the TV — two outs, no runs.

Would it kill someone to score in the first inning for once and make life easy? I nodded along to the thought.

My shoulder was already loose, and since I was a pitcher, the only thing to grab was my glove.

I rose from my seat and made the short walk down the corridor — dugout, field, mound.

—"Wild Thing has come back!"

As I stepped onto the mound, the opening bars of my walk-up music poured from the speakers. Truthfully, I didn't know the song well — I'd chosen it purely because I loved that signature sound from the singers who performed it.

I puffed myself up, just a little, and looked toward home plate.

Sure enough, Min-gi sunbae was settled in behind the plate with his usual businesslike expression. I fired a pitch harder than a casual game of catch, then flicked him a thumbs-up. He received it perfectly, as expected.

Good. Honestly, ever since I fell into this world and started playing baseball, every game had been fun — but today was going to be truly fun.

Well, well. We are thoroughly, comprehensively screwed.

So thought Ki Won-sang, Gwangju's local boy, a leadoff hitter now old enough to be called a grizzled veteran.

He'd always been famous for sharp eyes and quicker instincts, and true to reputation, he could tell at a glance that Kim Yi-seon up on the mound was in exceptional form. Especially that smile when their eyes happened to meet — something he never did in his usual routine.

Anyone else might've read it as a shy, half-embarrassed greeting. But to Ki Won-sang's eyes it was crystal clear: the man's body and mood were feeling so good he couldn't help smiling without realizing it.

Planning to throw 170 today, are we? He gripped the bat with that thought.

For all his dramatics, he wasn't especially nervous. That was simply the nature of baseball. No matter how perfect your ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠condition, an unlucky day got you shelled for home run after home run, and on a lucky day you threw a shutout while your stuff betrayed you.

The leadoff hitter's job was to pin that luck firmly in the opponent's disfavor.

So he'd play the long game.

First pitch.

"Striiiike!"

—"First pitch, called strike up in the zone."

He'd never intended to swing anyway, so he simply watched — and compared to the analyzed footage, the ball felt just a touch less vicious?

The velocity itself was 156 km/h, a fairly ordinary (?) figure. Maybe the kid was simply in high spirits while his actual condition was mediocre — that was the conclusion forming in his mind.

He filed it away without dwelling on it. It could easily have been one bad pitch.

The next pitch followed.

"Striiiike!"

—"Pitch two, called strike low and in."

—"Beautiful location, wouldn't you say? Probably a changeup. Ah — on the slow-motion replay, yes, a changeup. Kim Yi-seon is remarkable for how willingly he stabs changeups in there even against same-handed hitters."

—"The count goes to 0-and-2."

The count had tilted hopelessly against him, yet Ki Won-sang felt his mind grow calmer.

Ah. So that's what his changeup looks like.

Every time he voiced this to teammates, they told him to quit lying — but Ki Won-sang genuinely had the ability to deduce a breaking pitch, at least in part, from the ball's flight alone.

Fastballs, with all their spin, showed a flood of red seams that tinted the ball faintly pink; breaking pitches generally registered whiter to the eye.

The exact shade varied by pitcher, by the day's condition — you had to confirm it from the batter's box yourself — but fortune had smiled on him: those first two pitches had shown him the exact colors of Kim Yi-seon's two primary pitches.

Watching Kim Yi-seon prepare pitch three, Ki Won-sang re-set his grip on the bat.

Textbook logic said a pitcher ahead 0-and-2 would waste one. But Kim Yi-seon leaned heavily on his four-seam's bite, and he was a pitcher who enjoyed attacking — so the odds were low.

And sure enough, the ball leaving Kim Yi-seon's hand was a deep, unmistakable red. Identical to the fastball he'd just seen.

The target would be up in the zone for a called strike again — or else a rising fastball on a trajectory meant to induce a whiff. He'd resolved to play the long game, but he could not let this one get away.

Recalling the data — that Kim Yi-seon's fastball arrived noticeably higher than the eye judged it — he prepared to swing on a slightly steeper upward plane, angling for an early, damaging long ball if it connected—

"Striiiike! You're out!!!"

—"The third pitch falls off the table! Swinging strike three! Kim Yi-seon cuts down the leadoff hitter on just three pitches!"

—"Wait — what exactly was that pitch? I don't believe we've ever seen that from Kim Yi-seon before?"

The bat sliced through empty air.

A splitter? It dropped like one, sure, but it had darted quite a bit farther outside. A curve? He'd been watching for a curve too, locked in. And yet the ball had looked — unmistakably — like a fastball.

With the confusion in his head still hopelessly tangled, Ki Won-sang had no choice but to trudge back to the dugout.

...Walking away from Kim Yi-seon's smile, which by now looked downright infuriating.