Communicating with the Batter (1)
"It's been a while, Kim Yi-seon."
There I was, loosening up like I always did before a start. The unwritten rule says you leave the day's starting pitcher alone—friend or foe, they're wired tight on game days—but Lee Seung-kwon strolled right up and addressed me anyway.
It only went smoothly because I'm not the sensitive type. If some hothead had been on the mound, he'd have exploded on the spot. When an opposing player talks to your starter before first pitch, even without meaning anything by it, it can come across as an attempt to rattle your head.
Coming from a guy with a reputation, that would've been some genuinely underhanded gamesmanship. But there wasn't a shred of scheming in his eyes, and honestly, he's a rookie who doesn't know any better—so I decided to let it slide.
"Yeah. Hey."
Letting it slide doesn't mean I have anything to say to him, though. You need to actually know someone to hold a conversation.
"How's your condition today?"
I had no idea why he was asking the opposing starter that, but the honest answer was too complicated, so I just gave him the easy one. You get it, right? He's the enemy—it'd be weird to be upfront about it, and lying felt a little cheap.
But at my answer, Lee Seung-kwon's face softened with something like relief, and he left me with one last remark.
"Good. Show me your very best today, Kim Yi-seon. I'll show you nothing less than mine."
And with nothing more than that, he turned crisply on his heel and headed back to the visiting dugout.
As I watched him go, Jun-yun hyung wandered over at his own pace.
"Wow. All that talk about the Golden Generation, and you guys actually all know each other? He's from the Northern District, so I've only heard rumors myself—they say he's really that good. What was he like in high school?"
Playing the same shortstop position, Jun-yun hyung was clearly interested.
For my part, knowing exactly how the so-called Golden Generation came to be, the nickname always struck a slightly strange chord. It's no coincidence that so much talent is packed into my age group—it's the product of manga-style narrative allowance.
The protagonist of the manga was Kang Min-hyuk, and broadly speaking, the whole cast was that same 2001-born generation, so of course that era would be stacked with great players. It only follows.
So, as a devoted fan of the original work this world is built on, I could answer Jun-yun hyung's question about Lee Seung-kwon with complete confidence.
"Actually, no. We barely know each other. Honestly, this feels like the first time I've ever met him."
Which is to say: I know absolutely nothing.
He walked up and boldly said it's been a while, so we've clearly crossed paths somewhere... Did I ever face him at a national tournament?
That's just how high school baseball works in this world. No matter how famous a national-level prospect you are, meeting other top guys regularly is one thing—actually facing them in a national tournament even once counts as lucky. Thanks to that, I can count on one hand the draft classmates I even remember the faces of.
You might ask, didn't you see them in the manga? But being first-round-caliber talent doesn't guarantee you screen time, and the manga mostly featured the guys who happened to face Wirye Jeil High.
Since Lee Seung-kwon isn't in my memory either, he probably only flickered past in a background panel or two.
My answer must have caught him off guard, because Jun-yun hyung asked again.
"You've never met him? Then how are you two having such a natural conversation?"
"He marches up and says 'long time no see'—what am I supposed to do, ask him who he is?"
Trust me, when that actually happens to you, it is unbearably awkward. Besides, right now he's practically radiating fighting spirit for some reason. Prodding him with "wait, do I know you?" would only backfire spectacularly.
"Huh. And here I was thinking you two had some noble rivalry carried over from your high school days."
"Pfft, who does that anymore? Even in high school, everyone was too busy worrying about their own college placement or going pro. Who had time to care about somebody else?"
Guys who played on the national U-18 team together might have that kind of bond or rivalry, but somehow I never even ended up playing there.
As for Lee Seung-kwon, he's probably just hyping himself up because a classmate of his has been making noise lately and happens to be starting today. I doubt he's been carrying me around in his memory since high school.
Kim Yi-seon. That insufferable bastard—I figured he'd have forgotten all about me, but he remembers.
Back in the Rangers' dugout, Lee Seung-kwon quietly gathered himself, and with a flicker of delight, stoked his competitive fire even higher.
He had gone head-to-head with Kim Yi-seon only once: the autumn of his second year, at the Blue Dragon Championship. But Lee Seung-kwon still could not forget that game.
There were other pitchers overflowing with as much confidence as Kim Yi-seon. There were others—though not quite at his level—throwing seriously nasty stuff.
But only one man ever looked down on everyone with that same arrogance, and then proved that the arrogance wasn't an act at all. It was pure ability.
Maybe that was why he fixated on Kim Yi-seon like this—to return that arrogance in full...
"What, that's Kim Yi-seon? The guy our prince hates that much?"
"He doesn't hate him. He wants to beat him. That's all it is."
"Same thing, isn't it?"
While Lee Seung-kwon was sorting through his thoughts with a grave expression, the one who'd piped up was Hwang Jong-moon, the third baseman who covered the infield alongside him—a senior who, before Lee Seung-kwon's arrival, had been the most highly touted infielder in the Uiju Rangers organization, before failing to establish himself at shortstop and shifting over to third.
"Honestly, our Seung-kwon already acts like the world revolves around him, and there's someone even worse out there. Life's just not fair."
Which made Lee Seung-kwon's behavior all the more fascinating to watch. This guy was already a monster, and Kim Yi-seon was somehow a cut above that? Who is this guy?
Seung-kwon would be hurt if he heard it said outright, but anyone with eyes could see it: the classic second fiddle, burning his inferiority complex into competitive fuel.
To be fair, that kind of motivation isn't inherently bad. But that mindset comes with an unspoken admission that you're one step behind—and thinking like that has a nasty habit of curdling into defeatism.
For a player who'd already been knocked down and needed to claw his way back up off the floor, maybe. But for Lee Seung-kwon, whose road still stretched wide open ahead of him, it was an unhealthy mindset to be carrying this early. Which is exactly why Hwang Jong-moon deliberately brought up the topic everyone had been pretending not to notice—giving his junior a shot of motivation.
"Hey, did you hear? Your All-Star voting total is right on Kim Yi-seon's heels."
"Yes. I'm aware."
"Then this is simple. Don't just win today—blow them out. If we crush them, his tally takes a nosedive and yours shoots right into first-place territory, no? Let's go win this thing in style."
The All-Star Game. Under normal circumstances it's hardly an event worth hanging your hat on—it's an exhibition, plain and simple. But victories stack up one small thing at a time, and that stacking is where confidence is born. That's how the belief that I am the best takes root.
"So here's the deal: I'll set the table up front, and you—our baby rookie—clean it all up with a home run. Got it?"
"Yes, sir!"
Which meant that, just for today, he'd have to lay down a plush carpet to let their youngest get his confidence going.
The opponent was such an absurdly broken player that it wouldn't be easy, sure... But at the end of the day, the man was human. How bad could it be? He could lay down at least one scoring chance for Seung-kwon, couldn't he?
Hwang Jong-moon would come to regret that thought almost immediately.
"Holy— is that guy actually a rookie? The man himself is terrifying."
Top of the first. Barely minutes into the game, and left fielder Seo Min-hyun—just retired at the plate—passes along a word of warning to Hwang Jong-moon before heading back to the dugout.
This was a hitter with plate vision good enough to hold down the Rangers' leadoff spot permanently, and a man not in the habit of whining about anything.
"I've got zero feel for what his stuff even is. The curve especially—it doesn't have that big an angle coming out of the hand, then just drops. It's basically a splitter. Like what the Busan kids throw."
"No way, Min-hyun hyung. Seriously? That bad?"
Seo Min-hyun grumbled that for once, he genuinely had no read on the pitcher.
This was the same hyung who used to say he could "get a feel for it after watching a few pitches" back when Lee Si-hwan was still throwing in Korea before heading to the States. Just how nasty does a guy have to be?
It was hard to picture. He'd only heard about the 164 km/h fastball and seen it on video—he'd never stood in the box against it, so it didn't feel real.
But if it was Seo Min-hyun saying it. This hyung didn't talk nonsense, so Hwang Jong-moon ratcheted up his focus a notch as he stepped into the box.
And the moment he did, he began to understand what Seo Min-hyun had meant.
"Yeah, okay. Terrifying checks out."
He'd only ever heard about the famous routine, but there was Kim Yi-seon, initiating a staring contest. His gaze was flat-out intense.
He'd thought Seung-kwon's eyes, as he prepared for today's game, were pretty fierce too—but this was the kind of look that reminded him of his younger self, walking into his future in-laws' house to beg for permission to marry their daughter.
Eyes that said he would not rest until he had beaten the man in front of him.
Still, he took his stance. The opponent might be burning with killing intent, but that was no reason to lie down and die quietly, was it?
—"Hwang Jong-moon steps in, ready to hit. One out, nobody on."
—"Hwang Jong-moon really developed his power along with a serious bulk-up after settling in at third base last season, you know. He was always a good hitter, but he's growing into one of the league's premier sluggers right now."
The Uiju Rangers were one of the franchises that championed American-style baseball.
That showed in their lineup construction: they did use the sharp-eyed Seo Min-hyun in the leadoff spot, but the two-hole hitter Hwang Jong-moon, the three-hole Lee Seung-kwon, and cleanup man Travis—the foreign import—meant the heart of the order was three straight hitters built for extra bases.
The traditional cleanup trio sits at three-four-five, with your best bat at four, but this lineup leaned a little harder into the two-hole.
He and Travis, standing at second and fourth, were both regarded as hitters capable of twenty or more home runs every single season.
Even if a ball didn't clear the fence, Hwang Jong-moon had the wheels to punish a shortstop's defense—to turn an ordinary single into a double, a double into a triple.
So throw whatever you like. I'm ready.
"Ball."
[149 km/h]
—"First pitch, ball. It runs in off the inside edge."
—"He looked like he was attacking the inside border, but the ball just missed in a touch, wouldn't you say?"
—"And Hwang Jong-moon... he's standing there frozen, staring at where the ball landed in the catcher's glove."
...
What the hell was that? On purpose?
Seoul Twins' catcher today was Bang Min-soo, a draft classmate of his. They'd crossed paths in national tournaments back in high school, and he'd even faced him briefly in a handful of Futures League games—hardly a stranger.
So he asked, out of that old classmates' bond: that last pitch—was that a brushback?
"..."
Bang Min-soo said nothing. The man was famously a man of few words, sure, but as far as Hwang Jong-moon remembered, he always answered when asked a direct question. Whatever. Message received.
Kim Yi-seon had been watching his body, intently. Maybe he was just attacking the inside corner and being careful not to actually hit him... but there's such a thing as a hitter's instincts, aren't there? First the murderous glare, and now this. That was unmistakably a signal: back off.
Ha. A freshly debuted high schooler throwing brushback pitches? With stuff that obviously couldn't find the plate if his life depended on it?
This wasn't just guts—this was a certified lunatic. And he'd thought their own Seung-kwon was the last of that breed.
He stood still for a moment, tracking the ball's flight path, but he didn't stretch the silent protest any longer. Dragging it out would only hand the momentum to the pitcher.
He stepped back in and readied himself for the next pitch—pressing right up against the strike zone on purpose, as if to say, go ahead, throw it anywhere you dare.
Kim Yi-seon's face scrunched up in annoyance. Whether that was genuine loss of composure or psychological warfare scripted all the way down, Hwang Jong-moon couldn't tell. What was certain was that his message had gotten through.
Pitch two. Ready.
"Stri-i-ike!"
[157 km/h]
—"Two pitches in. Strike high."
—"That's Kim Yi-seon's signature, of course. When he pins a ball at that velocity into the top of the zone, most hitters simply can't react in time."
—"Count is one and one."
The pitch came in too fast to react to and bored in upstairs for a called strike.
But even taking the strike, Hwang Jong-moon couldn't help the grin of a man who'd just won the exchange.
You flinched, didn't you?
The pitcher had thrown at his body first, but the hitter had responded by crowding the plate even harder. In the standard script of a pitcher-hitter standoff, the next move would be another inside ball, trying once more to drive him back.
But Kim Yi-seon had avoided the inside corner this time. That was a declaration of surrender: I can't command my fastball with you standing that close to the plate.
That's right. No matter what kind of monster you are for a high schooler, no matter how absurd your stuff is—you're still a kid. Good. And since I've got to keep Seung-kwon's spirits up, I'm going to dig into you even harder.
Determined not to waste the opening, he stayed planted in the box without even loosening his stance.
At the sight of it, Kim Yi-seon's face twisted with unmistakable irritation. And then came pitch three.
The instant it left the hand, Hwang Jong-moon saw it. On its face, the ball looked to be flying straight at his body—but it wasn't aimed at him.
Can't command the inside corner, huh? So obviously he's going to fake a knockdown pitch with his curve.
Running the trajectory of Kim Yi-seon's curve from the scouting video through his head: a path like this one, coming from a fastball, might clip his forearm at worst. But as a curveball? It wouldn't graze him at all—it'd land low-middle in the zone.
Count still 1-1. If he'd read the play, there was no reason to hesitate.
He loaded up low, ready to rip an uppercut swing through the zone, and fired with everything he had. If he connected, the wall in far-off Jamsil was getting cleared. That was his resolve.
Crack!
"... S-str-r-ike!"
[159 km/h]
—"Pitch number three—wha—hit by pitch? No—swinging strike! The ball hit Hwang Jong-moon, but the umpire rules the swing!"
—"Judging by that low swing, he was sitting on Kim Yi-seon's knuckle curve, right? And this is exactly where you see how good Kim Yi-seon's curve really is. It's virtually indistinguishable from his fastball out of the hand."
—"Hwang Jong-moon is writhing in pain after taking that ball off the arm. But the count is 1-2. The at-bat is not over."
That hurt like an absolute son of a bitch.
It wasn't anywhere dangerous, and it had only caught him on the forearm, but the instant the ball hit, a wave of pain crashed over him—pain so violent he couldn't even scream.
He barely fought it down and turned to Bang Min-soo, ready to demand what the hell was going on—
"..."
The taciturn catcher was breaking out in a cold sweat, visibly flustered—so rattled it made Hwang Jong-moon wonder if the guy had this in him all along.
So that actually hit him.
I had zero intention of plunking anyone, but yeah—commanding inside-out was genuinely hard. Up-down control locked in almost immediately, so why the horizontal axis kept giving me trouble, I honestly couldn't say. Then again, I'm a two-arm guy, so maybe my left-right balance is just naturally fine?
Anyway, there was nothing deep behind putting a four-seamer inside on pitch three. It just looked like a good idea at the time.
Min-hyun hyung was walking out to the mound now, asking if I was angry or if something was wrong. Nothing of the sort. Do I look like a psycho who throws at people because he's mad?
I'd just wanted to steal an easy strike with a changeup on the first pitch. It ran more than expected, so ball one. On pitch two, per the dugout's call, the textbook high fastball. And on pitch three, the hitter looked like he was creeping in a little, so I figured I'd try one inside—threw the four-seamer. When a batter plants himself that tight, he can't react to a hard one busting him in.
It just tailed a bit more toward him than I planned, that's all. All in all, I'd call that a perfectly reasonable, by-the-book sequence of pitches. Min-who hyung, surely you're not about to take the catcher's mixed signals out on me and file a complaint, are you?
"...Right. If there's no problem, I'll head down."
"Please do."
Hwang Jong-moon rolled around on the ground in pain for a while after that, but thankfully nothing seemed injured—just a bruise—and he dug in for pitch four before striking out and heading back to the dugout.
I tipped my cap to him with an apology as he walked off, so as far as I was concerned, the whole incident was settled.
Incident wrapped up, I waited for the next hitter to step in—
"Ugh, why is he like this again?"
Lee Seung-kwon came to the plate radiating killing intent, like he'd just met his parents' murderer.
Were he and Hwang Jong-moon close? It wasn't even a serious injury, just a bruise. I didn't hit him on purpose, so I feel a little wronged, honestly. Whether Hwang Jong-moon himself or their dugout had accepted it wasn't intentional, nobody made much of a protest, at least.
Or maybe—was it about all that long time no see business before the game? Did he figure out I don't actually remember him? In that case, I could see him acting out of pure embarrassment.
Whatever the reason, this was no ordinary fighting spirit. We locked eyes like always, and his gaze was so fierce that even I—who'd come into this game mentally locked in—felt the pressure.
Yeah, this won't be easy. The way he'd chased me down to the wire in that All-Star vote—whether that's WPA or PPAP or whatever bizarre stat it's supposed to be—it clearly hadn't happened by accident, and this was the proof.
Well, nothing for it then. I don't hold any particular grudge against Lee Seung-kwon, but I've got my reasons too.
"Stri-i-ike!"
[162 km/h]
—"First pitch, called strike low!"
—"Ooh, crisp and clean. This is why Kim Yi-seon's pitching is so popular—it hits you like that."
Think of it as a form of respect, in a way.
"Stri-i-ike!"
[158 km/h]
—"Two pitches! Upstairs! Swinging strike!"
—"On the camera feed, that ball looked like it climbed several feet on its way in, didn't it? A fastball that genuinely earns the name 'rising fastball.'"
—"Count is oh-and-two."
That's on me too—my proposal to my fiancée deserves that level of commitment.
"Stri-i-ike! OUT!!!"
[164 km/h]
—"Oh! Dead-center of the zone, and FAST! Called strike three!"
—"I mean... I don't think a reaction was even possible there? And he's broken his own velocity record once again."
—"164 km/h! Tying his personal best and the all-time KBO record with the very same pitch, Kim Yi-seon slams the door on this inning in style."
Hey, cut me some slack—I'm going at you with everything I've got too, you know.
Lee Seung-kwon, who'd glared at me like he wanted to devour me whole on his way to the plate, seemed to have finally received the sincerity packed into my pitches—that hostility of his had visibly dialed down a notch.
See? That's why "genuinely trading everything with your opponent through sport" in manga isn't pure creative fantasy. It works just fine in real life—like this.