What If a Mad Scientist Is Calling Your Baseball Signs?

"Ooooh! This level of hip mobility, and the length and flexibility of your psoas is THIS good?! Yes! Let's measure everything else right now, quickly!"

Apparently deciding that since we were guests here for coaching and not patients, he didn't ask a single other question before hauling the two of us straight up to the second floor.

From there he began poking through every corner of Kang Min-hyuk's body with bizarre machines you'd only expect to find in some major hospital or research facility. His reaction started as mild, detached interest — but now he was in a full-blown frenzy.

"At this level you don't just meet the benchmarks I set in my theory — you exceed them. This is practically elite-tier!"

His appearance and his words were closer to some mad scientist running human experiments than a baseball coach.

Kang Min-hyuk, who for a baseball-obsessed kid was surprisingly old-fashioned and stubborn, started grumbling his complaints at me under his breath.

"I came because you told me to trust you, but is that old man actually reliable? He doesn't even seem like a former pro player."

"Oh, come on. Have I ever lied to you? I'm telling you, he looks like that, but he's the real deal."

What century are we living in, that you'd insist on former pros only? By that logic, legends from their playing days should be allowed to skip coaching certification entirely and go straight into managing pro teams.

"Back when I asked you whether you were interested in Min-ah, you told me no."

Uh... did that happen?

"Hey, what kind of penny-pincher memorizes stuff like that? Anyway, he might seem like a lunatic, but he's one of the top rehabilitation medicine specialists in the country."

That's right. That mad-scientist-looking old man was, astonishingly, once such a famous name in rehabilitation medicine that prominent politicians and chaebol families sought him out as their personal physician.

Now he's become a madman doing baseball research surrounded by suspicious machines, though.

"Alright! You there — what's your name?"

"Kang Min-hyuk, sir."

"Kang Min-hyuk... Kang Min-hyuk! Your body was sent down from heaven to throw underhand! Taking a physique like this and throwing from a plain three-quarter form is a waste of talent!"

Kang Min-hyuk stood there flustered, wondering what on earth this absurd nonsense was supposed to mean.

But that insane-sounding claim, against all expectation, was actually true. This was the very secret behind Kang Min-hyuk's perfect sixty-pitch saves in every single game in the manga.

Kang Min-hyuk was deeply conservative when it came to baseball. He was exactly the same in the manga — no matter how many problems he faced, he always tried to solve them through hard work rather than scientific approaches or technical refinements.

And unable to watch it anymore, one of the heroines — a Min-hyuk stan, of course — went looking for a private academy that offered instruction through pitching biomechanics.

What she stumbled upon back then was this place: the Underhand Biomechanics Lab.

More precisely, every other academy was either fully booked or so expensive she couldn't even get a consultation before giving up, and when she heard this place offered free consultations, she dragged Kang Min-hyuk here.

At that point in the manga, exactly the same scene as now played out.

"For the past five years I gave up practicing medicine and studied modern pitching biomechanics in the United States through countless papers and academic exchanges. And in the process, I developed a theory of my own. The method for creating the ultimate underhand pitch!"

There's a backstory for how he ended up like that, but let's move on. In short, Director Jo Sang-shik, determined to save the underhand pitch as its territory steadily shrank, threw himself into researching biomechanical theory specifically for underhand throwing.

Armed with the knowledge of the human body he already had as a doctor and a formidable intellect, he quickly mastered the latest theories and even reached the level of creating new ones — but along the way, he ran into a wall.

Underhand is, at its core, a throwing form that fights against gravity, so velocity is slower than a standard delivery. That much was fine — in exchange, you could throw pitches with more unique, dramatic movement, so it fell within the realm of trade-offs.

But as biomechanical theory advanced, the gap between underhand and conventional deliveries began to widen beyond the level gravity alone could explain, extending all the way to how efficiently the human body's raw power could be harnessed.

At a low arm angle, there was a hard ceiling on how much efficiency could be improved; but if you tried to raise the angle little by little to close the gap, you ended up with an arm angle practically indistinguishable from sidearm.

To Director Jo Sang-shik — a man obsessed with underhand to the point of madness — this was unbearable. And so he researched a delivery that could maintain an arm angle legitimately worthy of being called underhand while keeping the gap with conventional forms to a minimum.

And somewhere in that process, he had a complete shift in perspective. If it's hard to fit the form to the human body, why not just fit the human body to the form?

He began reworking his theory around specific physical measurements. At first the conditions weren't all that strict — after all, a theory only a tiny handful of people could ever learn would be meaningless.

A certain bone had to be longer than average; a certain muscle group had to be bigger than the bottom thirty percent — he built the theory on a handful of these reasonably plausible criteria.

But his obsession with getting as close as possible to the energy efficiency of modern pitching forms kept driving him further, and by the time Director Jo Sang-shik's theory was complete, it had simultaneously become a theory that needed to be thrown away.

Well, naturally — the thing had over a dozen conditions attached to it. Not OR — AND. Anyone with even a passing knowledge of statistics or science knows as a matter of common sense: a human being whose every single measurement is exactly average does not exist on this earth.

Yet Director Jo Sang-shik had created a theory applicable only to bodies with a dozen-plus natural traits all above average.

A year ago, he finished the theory and opened a training academy in Korea to search for qualified candidates, but between these picky requirements and the drawback of not being a former pro, the academy attracted no customers — and suitable candidates even less so.

"Look at this! Your femur length is in the top three percent proportionally! And the length ratios between your core ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠muscles here are in the top two percent, and—"

But Kang Min-hyuk? Apparently all dozen-plus of those conditions weren't just barely over the cutoff line — they were all elite-tier. Look at how Yasin, that bastard, rigged his character settings. Absolutely shameless.

With settings like that, Kang Min-hyuk started training three months before the Phoenix Flag Tournament and switched to underhand just like that. Does that make any sense? Fully adapting to a brand-new pitching form in barely three months?

Any team that didn't drop him after that had to have a cracked skull.

After being subjected to the director's hymn of praise for the underhand pitch and the One Hundred Reasons You Must Throw Underhand until he was thoroughly sick of it, Kang Min-hyuk said he'd gotten the gist and slipped away.

And only then did the director finally register that a second guest was present, belatedly turning his attention to me.

"So, did you come to learn underhand too?"

"No, sir. I'm planning to learn with a standard form."

"I see, I could tell. One look and I can see you're not built for underhand."

Obviously. Why would a body built to throw 160 km/h overhand ever throw underhand? He didn't push the underhand angle the way he had before, but the director still examined me here and there, trying to take in as much detail as possible.

"Oh, your hamstrings are seriously solid."

"That lower back — you'd be better off doing weightlifting or judo, honestly. And your flexibility and coordination look excellent too."

"It shows you've taken good care of yourself. Your lats are in great shape with barely any inflammation at all, and your pecs are flexible rather than stiff, like a baseball player's should be."

With every body part he examined, exclamations of admiration came pouring out — not quite at the level of Kang Min-hyuk, but pouring out all the same.

Natural gifts are one thing, but I'd worked my tail off to build myself up to this level, so I was feeling pretty proud of myself. Then, right at that moment, the director's expression during the examination suddenly turned sour.

"Hold on... you haven't had a thorough medical checkup recently, have you?"

"Come on, I'm an athlete — I get one every six months like clockwork."

"A full-body one?"

"Yes."

Tilting his head in thought for a moment, the director immediately pulled out his phone and dialed somewhere.

"Hello? Director Park, it's Jo Sang-shik. Yes, been a while. Nothing urgent, but is your MRI slot open right now? Oh, it happens to be free? Great. I'm on my way now, so keep it open."

The moment he hung up, he grabbed me, shoved me into his car, drove me to some major hospital, and stuffed me into a precision scanner.

It's a familiar routine every six months, so I know the drill, but doing it out of nowhere like this is a bit startling.

About an hour passed, I suppose. When the director returned to the lab with the results in hand, he looked absolutely furious about something.

"And the other doctors really said nothing at all?"

"No, sir. They just said everything was clean and there was nothing unusual."

"These quacks. Every last license should be revoked."

After cursing out the medical profession for a good long while, the director finally spoke.

"You've never pitched before, have you? Judging by the condition, probably not — count yourself genuinely lucky."

Then came the sudden remark. But I had a feeling I knew the reason.

"What's wrong with my results?"

"You don't look like you know much about this field, so I'll keep it short and simple. See this image? This is a picture of your shoulder."

He showed me an MRI image. Honestly, even I could barely tell what I was looking at. I could at least tell the bone was big and sturdy.

"See this? This is one of the muscles commonly called the rotator cuff. I won't get into the details — just know that if you injure this, you can't throw a ball anymore."

To baseball fans, the rotator cuff is a name you hear constantly. So that's what it looks like. In the manga, Kim Yi-seon collapsed after injuring exactly this.

"To put it very simply... yours is out of balance right now. Your other muscles and bones are this big, but this part is small."

"It's a problem you sometimes see during growth spurts. When the body grows fast in a hurry, the balance gradually drifts out of alignment, and issues like this can develop."

"So what kind of problem does that cause?"

"A problem, obviously! It's one of the main areas that absorbs shock when you throw. If it's out of balance like this, the impact is going to pool right there, isn't it? I'll guarantee you this — if you keep throwing without knowing, your shoulder could genuinely get shattered."

Wow. So this old man isn't just a character gimmick — he really is a top-tier physician. He found what other doctors couldn't even detect in full-scale checkups with just a few quick examinations, didn't he?

My trust in Director Jo Sang-shik went up several notches.

"But there's a way to mitigate it, right?"

In terms of settings, he's Korea's greatest rehabilitation specialist. Until a few years ago he was in the US, and even in Korea his rates were so astronomical I could never have afforded a meeting — but if I can meet him like this, he's a cheat code.

"It's not that there's no way. Your height is just about done growing, but for boys the muscles keep developing for a while, so it might improve gradually as you grow. In the end it's a matter of muscles and ligaments, so if we combine strengthening exercises with physical therapy, it will get better."

After pondering briefly, the director brought up the topic in a slightly persuasive tone.

"Honestly, if I handle it, it won't be to the point where you can't pitch. But even so, it would only ever be adjustment and mitigation — matching the durability of everyone else would be difficult. Do you absolutely have to be a pitcher?"

"I'm definitely going to pitch."

I hadn't known it was a flaw most doctors wouldn't even find — something only one of the country's top rehabilitation specialists would even notice — but regardless, a defect in this body was within the range I'd anticipated.

Well, of course — Yasin told me my interpretation was all correct. Being a glass cannon wasn't just a figure of speech; I'd always assumed even that would fall within the scope of that interpretation.

"I'm not joking. I'm saying this with my medical license on the line — even with diligent care, pitching regularly like everyone else will be difficult. If you measure it in innings, you'd be lucky to throw two-thirds of what others do."

Oh, then it's no problem at all.

I grinned and declared, loud and proud:

"Even with reduced shoulder durability, it's fine. I'm a switch pitcher too."

And with that, I casually demonstrated, writing with both hands at once.

The director stared at the display, puzzled, as if he hadn't heard right.

"Even if you're ambidextrous, what does that have to do with anyth—"

The moment those words left his mouth, the director smacked his forehead with his palm. To be fair, ambidextrous pitching would be hard to predict with common sense alone. His shock, I understand.

"...You're not actually thinking that just because your dominant hand is 'both hands,' you can throw a ball with either one?"

Apparently his surprise was for a different reason.

"Isn't that exactly it?"

Shouldn't the throwing hand be the dominant hand? Even now, switching between right-handed and left-handed batting is easy enough, but right-handed and left-handed pitching are hard to swap.

"Haah... then by that logic, there'd be no such thing in this world as right-handed people who pitch left-handed, or the reverse. Your dominant hand matters, yes, but what matters far more is that your muscles and physical attributes suit the throwing motion."

"If it's muscles, you just train them, right?"

"And that's exactly the problem. It wouldn't literally be double, but you'd have to train both arms separately, so the required training volume shoots way up."

"Then ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠you just train that much more. Problem solved, no?"

"You ignorant child. Do you think training capacity is infinite? Sure, you can alternate arms, but the body doing that training is one single mass. Your body gets fatigued and needs recovery, which means there's a hard ceiling on training volume."

Huh. Hearing it laid out like that, it kind of makes sense.

"And no one has yet determined what kind of stress the act of constantly switching between left and right throwing places on the body. Some argue it strains the body. Do you want to use your own body as a lab experiment?"

Still, haven't ambidextrous pitchers shown up occasionally? Since those people exist, it probably wouldn't shatter my body outright, right? And the director himself said that apart from the thing he wouldn't speak about directly, the rest of me was rock solid.

It's definitely a gamble. But what I want is to play baseball without getting ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠injured — being injury-free isn't the goal in itself.

Frankly, Kim Yi-seon the batter was starting to hit his limits. I still had the confidence to drive the ball when I connected — but actually connecting was getting harder and harder.

Against the weak weekend-league schools it might not matter, but against the powerhouse teams we'd meet at the national tournament, contributing to a win through hitting alone was getting difficult.

So if training is hard, I'll endure it; and if the training volume still isn't enough, I'll throw anyway, regrets and all. I simply have no other option, is what I'm saying.

"...If I really do throw with both arms, the load gets distributed, so maybe it'd be fine? No — still, with zero data on this, making a kid into a human test subject isn't... but he wants it that badly, so should I really...?"

After muttering to himself for a long while at my words, the director seemed to finally make up his mind and began speaking carefully.

"Hmm... however I look at it, it's far too uncertain a possibility. As a doctor, I'm reluctant to attempt it. Correcting your shoulder I can agree to — but treat the two-handed idea as rejected."

The words of a man who, eccentric and half-mad as he seemed, took real pride in being a physician. But this, too, fell within the range of the scenario I'd anticipated.

"I see? Then there's nothing to be done about it. Thank you for the diagnosis. I'll be going, then."

"Right. Don't be too discouraged. Even if pitching isn't in the cards, your body itself is excellent. You'll go far as a batter too."

Feeling genuinely sorry, apparently, he even offered some well-wishes, out of character as it was. He really didn't have to.

"Hey, Kang Min-hyuk. Let's go."

"Huh?"

At my call, the director panicked.

"Wait — you're supposed to stay! You're going to learn underhand, aren't you?"

"I'm sorry, but a friend recommended this place and I came along. I'm not all that interested, so I'll head back too."

Right — baseball conservative Kang Min-hyuk would never intend to learn anything here without me. In the original story, the heroine had to plead and plead just to barely get him to come learn, so of course.

The director's panic escalated beyond flustered into full scrambling.

"Son! Min-hyuk! I'm telling you, this is a once-in-a-lifetime talent! Underhand pitching has fallen out of fashion, sure, but pro teams still have plenty of demand for it. At your level, done right, you could even make it to the majors!"

But Kang Min-hyuk looked wholly uninterested.

To put it in martial arts terms: a heaven-blessed prodigy worthy of inheriting the reclusive master Jo Sang-shik's secret arts was about to walk right out the door.

Well then, Director. Are you really going to give up just like that?

Sure enough, the director raised the white flag. Apparently his love for the underhand pitch ran deeper than his conscience as a doctor. Otherwise he'd never have sunk hundreds of millions of won into building this research lab and training academy packed with cutting-edge equipment.

But right up to the end, he imposed one condition on me.

"In exchange, you won't throw an actual ball for a while. Before you throw anything, the priority is improving your shoulder's condition as much as possible and building the balance your body needs to pitch."

And this was exactly why I had gone out of my way to seek out Director Jo Sang-shik.

Certainly, knowing things from the manga gave me an edge, but his profile itself was a perfect fit for me. An outstanding rehabilitation specialist with deep knowledge of the human body, and so versed in pitching theory that he could originate his own.

On top of that, even granting that Kang Min-hyuk was a prodigy and underhand was the director's most obsessive research subject, pulling off a complete transition to an underhand form in just three months is coaching skill of no ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠ordinary caliber.

Just look at him now — already pulling out methods to somehow salvage my shoulder on the spot.

"And even once your shoulder balance is somewhat corrected, you won't throw a real ball until your pitching form is complete. Training that involves actually throwing comes after that."

"About how long will that take?"

"Hmm. It depends on your aptitude, but since you'll have to train both arms, even at the shortest, three months — at the longest, six."

Six months? It's September now, so that means March of next year?

"Six months is when next year's weekend league season opens, sir."

"That's the short estimate. You've never trained as a pitcher separately before, so your shoulder is a blank slate — no ingrained nerves or bad habits — and that's the only reason it's this fast. Otherwise we'd be talking years."

On this point, the director would absolutely not budge.

Nothing to be done, I suppose. Repairing glass that would shatter at the slightest knock was never going to be easy.

And so I threw myself into the next phase of the Keep Kim Yi-seon Healthy and Playing Baseball Plan: Operation Reinforced Glass.