Is This Some Kind of Setup?

Is this some kind of setup?

I brushed off Kang Min-hyuk's words without a second thought, but for some reason, the other seniors, the manager, and the coaches were all giving me the same look.

"Huh? Something's off with the Mariners? They look frozen out there compared to normal? ...Right."

"Here's the thing, Yi-seon... actually, never mind."

"Rookie, I know you're the weird one, but you manage to surprise me every time I watch you pitch."

To put it precisely, everyone seemed to have plenty they wanted to say but was reluctant to say it to my face. That particular brand of frustration that says, If I explain it, you won't get it anyway? They'd toss out a word or two and then just walk away.

It's not ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠like I'm some rookie to be dismissed. What is this?

After asking around this person and that for ages, I eventually circled back and asked Minsu-hyung.

"Minsu-hyung. No matter how I think about it, something's off. You're catching my pitches today, so you should be able to tell, right?"

My condition today wasn't perfect. My overall form was good, but my touch was lagging—maybe because I'd only been doing individual training, or maybe because it'd been so long since I'd pitched in a real game.

So my command was shakier than usual, and while my breaking stuff still had life, the location just wasn't settling in.

And yet the opposing hitters were acting strange. Some were swinging the bat like a runaway fan, others just stood there staring blankly. Extreme, to say the least.

You could argue that if they can't hit me, that's a good thing—but you need to understand the reason. If I just keep throwing like this without knowing why, and their scheme suddenly clicks into place, I'll get shelled with home runs and lose the game.

Mariners Park isn't exactly a home run killer like our own Jamsil, after all.

Minsu-hyung listened to me for a long while, mulled it over, and finally opened his mouth.

"Hmm... I don't know. Or maybe I just don't get it either."

"No, that's exactly what I'm asking—why is that?"

"If you don't know, there's nothing to be done. You'll figure it out when the time comes."

"No, that's what I'm asking—why!"

Have they all banded together to give the starting pitcher a stroke? Why won't anyone just tell me straight?

It's a fact that we're in danger if the Mariners are running some kind of play. And everyone, from the manager and coaches to the seniors, is staring at me with that same inscrutable look Kang Min-hyuk wears.

Just as steam was pouring out of my ears and I was seriously debating—starting day or not—beating the answer out of Kang Min-hyuk tomorrow...

"Yi-seon. The defensive half-inning's starting. Get out there."

The manager's voice cut through. Consider yourself lucky this time, Kang Min-hyuk. (Yes, it was the seniors who frustrated me, and no, I'm not actually going to take a swing at a senior. I have that much common sense.)

I gave the manager a rough nod of acknowledgment, pulled on both my gloves, and trudged back up the mound.

No matter how I turned it over, I couldn't understand it. The Mariners hitters were weak against me back in the pennant race, sure. But they were merely weak—they never collapsed this listlessly.

I couldn't even guess what they were aiming at. Big, powerful swings hunting for a fluke long ball? That doesn't seem right—too many pitchers watch the ball too long. Then is it some trick to inflate my pitch count and drain my stamina? That feels partially plausible, but it doesn't seem like the main play either.

I couldn't grasp what calculation was behind any of it, but what could I do? We were mid-game.

Whatever their scheme was, if I simply threw my absolute best, I could adapt to some degree. All that was left was to give it everything I had.

Needless to say, the other players and the coaching staff weren't saying those things just to get under Kim Yi-seon's skin.

They simply had nothing to hide—and they knew that if they told him he was pitching brilliantly, he'd never swallow it.

In Kim Yi-seon's own eyes, his pitching today was mediocre—command wavering, the pitch mix somehow refusing to bend to his will. And yet—

"Striiike! Out!!!"

"Wow, damn. Terrifying even from right here."

"Is he doing it on gut feeling? No matter how I look, I can't tell his high strikes from his up-and-away balls."

"It's worse standing in the batter's box, trust me."

Kim Yi-seon's pitches, coming back fully rested, hit the Mariners like a hammer blow.

He'd always been strong. A guy who hurled insane velocity—an average in the high 150s peaking at 164 km/h—now armed with one or two devastating breaking balls on top. How were they supposed to deal with that?

But even against those fearsome pitches, there had been a method of attack. It hadn't worked well so far, but at the very least, there was a way to produce better results than walking in cold.

"We skipped the velocity-adaptation drills, and now I can barely even track that thing with the bat."

"Same here. I swung with ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠mindset of 'close your eyes and take your licks,' and my bat kept getting shoved back. What kind of movement is that?"

"Which idiot said Kim Yi-seon wouldn't pitch? And that even if he did, he'd be worse than usual?"

This time, even those attack plans didn't exist.

The manager, coaches, and analysis team had prepared only a brief dossier based on what they'd experienced during the pennant race—no detailed training sessions built from recent games or simulations.

The players had focused less on preparing for Kim Yi-seon and more on preparing for ordinary opponents.

And why not? There was little time left before the playoffs. Pouring resources into a pitcher who might not even appear—and who might not be at full strength if he did—hardly seemed wise.

Strictly speaking, thorough preparation would have been the right call, but the opponent was Kim Yi-seon. They'd struggle to beat him even fully prepared, and with the thought he might not show at all, it's no wonder they talked themselves into believing he wouldn't.

They're paying that price right now.

The fifth inning was already over. With two outs and nobody on, the Mariners' catcher and sixth hitter, Jang Soo-hyuk, stepped into the box.

Jang Soo-hyuk is a fiery soul. A man who says what needs saying to anyone without flinching, yet never plays small—every inch the macho veteran.

But facing Kim Yi-seon on the mound right now, he couldn't help it. Not fear, exactly—but an undeniable tension.

"..."

Something clearly didn't sit right with him—Kim Yi-seon's expression had been sour since around the second inning. And the first pitch came in merciless.

"Striiike!"

And there it is. That's the problem.

Kim Yi-seon's stuff was already absurd, but the guy who'd supposedly been groaning in pain—what did he eat while laid up that made his fastball even scarier?

His average velocity was supposed to be 158—which normally meant high 150s with the occasional spike past 160—but today, half his pitches were blowing past 160.

Forget raw radar numbers—the perceived velocity, the late life on the ball, everything felt nastier than the Kim Yi-seon they'd faced before. At this point you'd suspect the injury was a front and the guy had snuck off somewhere for a secret upgrade.

"Striiike!"

To make matters worse, the brat clearly knows his stuff is nasty, because he's just bludgeoning away. No soothing chase pitches, no pitch sequencing, no setup—nothing but raw, ignorant force, hammering straight down the middle.

Normally, seasoned Mariners hitters who'd eaten nothing but baseball their whole lives would punish that kind of arrogant pitching.

"Striiike! Out!!"

How is anyone supposed to punish that? Jang Soo-hyuk thought. The lunatic throws pitches nobody can touch even knowing what's coming—of course he's brazen enough to spam heaters. He knows exactly what he's doing.

Genuinely infuriating bastard.

The fifth inning ended, and cleaning time began.

"..."

"Yi-seon, what are you doing?"

"Something's off, I'm telling you."

It really is strange.

As I sat brooding in a corner, Senior Kang Hyun-seok wandered over.

It wasn't just him—everyone in the organization seemed worried—but I couldn't keep this question buried.

"Think about it, Senior. Right now my feel is gone, so I'm forcing everything through on pure power... and nobody's even trying to face me. What could they possibly be intending?"

My current pitch selection was a stopgap. Rather than toss middling pitches with dulled touch, I was concentrating entirely on throwing my hardest stuff, squeezing out whatever velocity I could.

Which meant no time to think about sequencing, pitch tunnels off my breaking balls, any of it—just brute-force, head-on shoving matches.

Obviously, this isn't high school baseball. Against a KBO postseason club—widely rated equivalent to AAA ball—this strategy has no chance of holding up.

At best, it works for a reliever throwing one inning, or a swing-man responsible for one trip through the order.

There's no stamina management, no game management, no strategy—you simply can't stretch a start this way.

"Er... if it's working right now, isn't that what counts? If it stops working, the manager will adjust."

Even Kang Hyun-seok, with his long career, seemed unable to read the situation, deflecting with a vague answer. Right. Hard to blame him.

There have been relievers in KBO history who got through an inning or two on the fastball alone, and even I used only two pitches early in my debut—fastball and changeup—but I still split the usage.

A case like this—going deep into a game as a starter while throwing 95 percent fastballs without issue—practically doesn't exist.

Could they be baiting me into leaning more and more on the fastball, narrowing my options, then hunting the heater with pinpoint precision? That feels shaky too.

"Put the worrying away and get some rest. When your starter's dealing, don't think about anything else—just think about keeping yourself ready."

"Yes, sir..."

Watching Kim Yi-seon trundle off toward the players' lounge, Kang Hyun-seok thought to himself.

"I always knew our rascal was a lunatic, but lately it's getting out of hand."

"Who's arguing?"

Ji Ha-seob chimed in from beside him.

He doesn't know what the other side is plotting?

Everyone—the opposing team and ours alike—had clocked it two pitches into the game.

The kid took a short breather and came back with his stuff turned up to full monster mode.

"If he throws garbage like that and then asks us why nobody can hit it, why they can't time it, why they're either whiffing or just watching—what are we even supposed to say back?"

"And if we just tell him 'you're pitching that well,' he gets angry and says there's no way that's it. Honestly, I can't tell if the guy's self-esteem is sky-high or rock-bottom."

The data lab says Kim Yi-seon's average fastball velocity today was 160.

Can you believe it? For every other pitcher, that's dream velocity—his today average. And while bombarding hitters with it back to back, he's racking his brain going, They can't hit me, so there must be a hidden strategy. What a sight.

He's always been like this. No—first the insane fastball, then a perfectly serviceable changeup, and mid-season he insists on forcing a third pitch into existence, and out comes that absurd knuckle curve.

Then a changeup that anyone could see was unusual but extremely effective—what about it displeased him? He grumbled about it all season, tore it apart at the midpoint, and came back with that bizarre, terrifying modified changeup.

And today, on top of raising his average velocity by a good 2 km/h and breaking his all-time velocity record, apparently throwing wall-to-wall ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠fastballs counts as "monotonous pitching."

If you can throw heat like that, why would you even need breaking balls at the KBO level? Apparently the Mariners hadn't even done their velocity-adaptation drills. Convenient.

Thanks to that, he posted an immaculate inning in the fifth, and the opposition can't get anything going at all.

"Honestly, if there were a hitter alive who could actually touch that stuff, MLB would be flying him over tomorrow. The more you watch, the more I realize—he massively overrates the opposition."

"Geniuses are all like that. 'I can do this much, so surely the other guys can do seventy, eighty percent of it too.'"

In Kang Hyun-seok's book, a Kim Yi-seon at seventy percent would still be the greatest draft prospect in history—the kind you'd take first overall every time.

As the pitchers murmured among themselves about all this, Kang Min-hyuk joined in.

"That's true. I've known Kim Yi-seon a long time, and he remains an incomprehensible individual. How can a man possess talent like that and yet fail to recognize his own worth?"

...

"..."

"...Is something the matter?"

"No. Nothing."

"Ah. Right."

Watching them, you'd almost think the two of them really were alike.

And with that, the pitchers collectively concluded, deep in their hearts: making those filthy genius freaks understand the world of ordinary people was simply impossible.

While the Twins pitchers settled things the easy way, the Twins position players were in a rather different state.

Are we embarrassed for not scoring while Yi-seon's grinding out there like that? Of course that feeling exists, but it's not a big one. Embarrassing as it is to admit, failing to score while Kim Yi-seon walls off the opposition is just everyday life for the Twins—hardly worth remarking on.

Do we pity the opposing hitters who have to face that insane stuff? Can't say that's entirely absent either, but they're professionals with a certain shamelessness of their own. It's not like they'll face Kim Yi-seon before they leave the team anyway. Who cares?

So why was this strange tension drifting through the dugout?

"Striiike! Out!!!"

"Phew. I'm so tense about fielding I might pull something. How am I supposed to hit like this?"

"Senior. We still have to give it our best, you know."

"Right, of course we do. Our Yi-seon already threw an immaculate inning today and he's on pace to break the strikeout record too, and if this keeps up he might just—"

"Hey! Zip it!"

"Gah!"

Because that great record was, just barely, beginning to glimmer at the edge of everyone's vision.

The Mariners' line on the scoreboard was a column of zeroes. R, H, E—three zeros, plain as day.

And the hitters Kim Yi-seon had faced in this sixth inning were the seven, eight, and nine-hole batters. Having come this far, everyone knew exactly what record they were staring at.

A perfect game.

Word was Kim Yi-seon had already thrown three of them back in high school, but in the KBO, it had never happened—not once in thirty-eight years. And today, that record might actually fall.

Sure, only six innings were in the books, but the momentum was undeniable. Today's Kim Yi-seon radiated an even fiercer intensity than in any shutout they'd seen from him.

No wonder the position players felt their nerves tighten with every play in the field. The opposing hitters and their manager were starting to rein in anything excessive—crowding the plate, over-aggressive bunting attempts—and the broadcast crew had the word rising to the tips of their tongues, still unable to say it aloud, while the manager and coaches overplayed their jokes and banter, pretending not to notice.

And the pitcher himself, the man at the center of it all? Oblivious, apparently—just mumbling "Seriously, why?" on repeat, looking every bit the clueless fool. But that's how it always is: when a record hangs in the balance, it's not the one setting it who sweats—it the reserve squad of accidental saboteurs who might ruin it.

If Kim Yi-seon's perfect game—the first in KBO history—failed to materialize because the Twins couldn't score and the game dragged into extra innings... or because a fielder botched a ball he should have caught cleanly, turning a sure out into a hit that wasn't quite an error...

Then their social lives—or perhaps their physical lives—could not be guaranteed.

And so, bit by bit, the air in the Twins dugout began to freeze solid.