TBITWAM 02

Episode 2

After leaving the old arcade, Lee Jong-hwa, the scout, got into the car next to Director Yoon Sung-geun and opened his mouth.

“Um, Director.”

His face showed that he absolutely couldn’t understand it no matter how much he thought about it.

“It’s true that player Chae Gang-woo was a talented player. But wouldn’t it be tough for him to switch from right-handed to left-handed? And on top of that, a knuckle ball…”

Scout Lee Jong-hwa’s face was serious.

” Isn’t that a completely impossible story?”

Realistically, it really was a hopeless story. It wasn’t like he was ambidextrous; a right-handed pitcher becoming a left-handed pitcher overnight? Well, they say nothing is impossible with effort, but still.

Even if he succeeded as a left-handed pitcher, a knuckle ball? And Director Yoon Sung-geun mentioned a high-speed knuckle ball at that.

“Director. What are you thinking?”

It had been 10 years since Lee Jong-hwa worked next to Director Yoon Sung-geun as a scout and strategy analyst. He knew Yoon Sung-geun that well.

He knew that Director Yoon Sung-geun hadn’t told player Chae Gang-woo to throw a knuckle ball for no reason.

Director Yoon Sung-geun, who had been listening with his arms crossed, laughed heartily.

“That guy. Did you see his shoulder?”
“His shoulder?”

It was natural for a pitcher to have good shoulders. The only thing that stood out was that his left shoulder seemed bigger than his right. That was it.

Scout Lee Jong-hwa narrowed his brow.

“Other than his left shoulder being bigger, nothing particularly caught my eye.”
“Exactly. His left shoulder is good. So good, it makes you wonder why he’s been throwing with his right all this time.”

His squinting eyes suddenly turned serious.

“A long time ago, I saw an interesting video. It was a kid who looked about twelve or thirteen. His father filmed and posted it, saying the kid had just started baseball not too long ago.”

As if reminiscing, Director Yoon Sung-geun’s gaze drifted into the air.

“The kid was about to throw the ball, and he gripped it in an interesting way.”
“Interesting… you say?”
“Yeah. He threw the ball about five or six times, but he bent his fingers and pushed it out.”

Gripping the ball not with his fingers on the seams, but with his fingers bent, and pushing it out?

That was precisely the knuckle ball grip.

“A twelve or thirteen-year-old would know a bit about baseball. At that age, wouldn’t he have thrown it because he was fascinated by the idea of throwing a knuckle ball, thinking it was cool?”

It was obvious. The knuckle ball was a ‘mystery ball,’ hard to throw, so a lot of kids around that age tried to learn it.

“Or maybe he threw it without knowing anything at all. He just gripped it comfortably, and it unintentionally ended up being a knuckle ball grip,”
“Right. That’s the important part.”

At Director Yoon Sung-geun’s words, Scout Lee Jong-hwa paused.

A kid who had just started baseball grips the ball comfortably, and that grip happens to be a knuckle ball?

“If the ball he threw that way was ordinary, I would have forgotten about it.”

At Director Yoon Sung-geun’s meaningful words, Scout Lee Jong-hwa’s expression slowly hardened.

“Don’t tell me. Was the ball good too?”

Director Yoon Sung-geun, nodding his head leisurely, had a sharp glint in his eyes.

“The fatal weaknesses of a knuckle ball are control and speed. But what do you think would happen if there was a knuckle ball who possessed both of those?”

It was an incredibly unrealistic story. A high-speed knuckle ball with good control? If the ball is fast, it would naturally have spin, so it couldn’t really be called a knuckle ball.

“…If such a player existed, they would have already dominated not just the KBO, but the MLB as well.”

If there really was a knuckle ball who could throw the ball at high speeds, with low spin, and also possess control, there would be no hitter who could face them.

“That twelve or thirteen-year-old kid in the video I saw was Chae Gang-woo.”

At that, Scout Lee Jong-ha asked back in surprise.

“Chae Gang-woo? You mean player Chae Gang-woo?”
“And in that video, he was throwing with his left hand.”

Director Yoon Sung-geun laughed heartily again and spoke his final words.

“Don’t you think he’ll become an interesting guy?”

I was doing something now that I only did back in elementary school. Right now, there was a rubber band wrapped around my left wrist. And that rubber band was tied to the doorknob.

“It’s killing me.”

After Director Yoon Sung-geun left, I threw myself into practice like crazy. My left hand still felt unfamiliar holding a baseball, so much so that I even slept gripping the ball.

Thinking my left arm strength was also lacking compared to my right, I even put a rubber band on my wrist. I checked my throwing motion by doing shadow pitching hundreds of times a day.

I was being cautious because I had ground down my right shoulder from overuse, but this wasn’t the time to be picky.

This was possibly my last chance.

My last chance to play baseball.

And then I realized it. The fact that my left shoulder was stronger than my right.

“Is it because I’ve been punching the machine since I was young?”

Normally, my shoulder would start to ache after over fifty shadow pitches, but strangely, it didn’t hurt.

I thought for sure it would creak and have problems, but rather, my arm motion was smoother than with my right.

Just in case, I even went to the hospital. All I heard was that my left shoulder was incredibly strong. Plus, compared to my injured right shoulder, the difference was severe; they said the bone was thicker, and the cartilage and muscles were better too.

I had been pounding that punching machine, and instead, it’s strong and healthy? Had it been trained?

I was puzzled, but after blankly staring at the baseball in my left hand, I suddenly jumped up from my seat.

The tryout was just around the corner, and with every minute and second precious, even thinking about other things was a luxury.

I should just throw the ball instead of wasting time like this.

I immediately ran to the arcade. I held out my glove towards my dad, who was sitting at the counter.

“Dad, can you catch some balls with me?”

Then, massaging his badly bruised chin, Dad looked up.

“Do you still say that after seeing my face?”
“…I didn’t do it on purpose, you know. It’s because you’re old, Dad. You should exercise. Before, when we played catch, you caught them just fine.”
“Hey, you punk!”

Whether he felt wronged or not, Dad raised his voice.

“Your ball is strange, I’m telling you! It floats up and then drops sharply…! It’s not even an Arirang ball.”
“It’s because I’m still not used to throwing left-handed. It was like that before too, remember? When I first started baseball.”

Come to think of it, that was true. When I was young and knew nothing, right after starting baseball, I heard left-handed pitchers were more effective than right-handed ones, so I started throwing with my left.

The problem was that the ball was unpredictable. When I threw with my right, the fastball would go straight, but when I threw with my left, it would dance around.

Of course, young as I was, I liked it, thinking it was a breaking ball. But when a friend I was playing catch with got hit in the head and passed out, I cleanly gave up throwing with my left.

Dad let out a sigh.

“Yeah, that happened. It hurt back then too, getting hit a few times, but now it hurts more. Because I’m old.”

Even so, seeing him get up to help me, I grinned.

“I’ll definitely make it to the pros.”
“Yeah, you punk.”

Under the darkening sky, we started playing catch in an empty lot with no one around. But we had to stop not long after.

“Ow! It hurts, you little bastard! Really.”

This time, it was because the ball slammed right into Dad’s chest.

“Oh. Dad, sorry!”

Frustration welled up inside me at the abruptly ended catch. Eventually, I sent Dad home first and stayed behind alone to throw the ball.

A pitcher needs a catcher to receive the ball…

“I feel bad asking him to help more.”

I couldn’t ask the baseball team players I was close with for help anymore either. Because every single one of them had been hit by my ball at least once.

“First, just throw.”

If there’s no one to receive, I’ll just have to throw, right?

Just as I was about to grip the ball with my left hand and start my pitching motion, I stretched out my fingers that were bending out of habit.

“Oh, wait.”

That’s when Director Yoon Sung-geun had asked me about being a high-speed knuckle ball. I lowered my gaze to my left hand. The grip I was using now was exactly the knuckle ball grip.

“Huh?!”

Unknowingly, I had been throwing knuckle balls with my left hand all this time. At first, I definitely gripped the seams and threw, but the more I threw, the more my fingers stood up. Eventually, I was holding the ball only with my fingertips.

“Ah, no wonder. No wonder the ball went wherever it wanted.”

Then something struck me, clearing the fog in my head.

“Wait. So did I originally know how to throw a knuckle ball?”

If the ball I threw so casually when I was young was a knuckle ball.

“If it was a knuckle ball from the start, it’s only natural that aiming it anywhere wouldn’t work.”

Then, all I had to do was just graze the borderline. The problem was whether a knuckle ball could be controlled.

But I had no choice.

Director Yoon Sung-geun told me to throw a high-speed knuckle ball with my left hand.

It wasn’t a matter of ‘I can do it’ or ‘I must do it’.

“I have to do it.”

So I can go to the pros, shut up that damn coach and director, and let my mom and dad, who suffered so much, live in comfort.

Besides, control.

“It’s what I’m most confident in.”

A right-handed orthodox fireballer. It wasn’t just because he was a fireballer that everyone liked him. It was because of his insane, sharp control.

A knuckle ball probably wouldn’t be an exception.

With a triumphant face, I gripped the baseball again. This time, very deliberately, I bent my fingers and held the ball with my fingertips.

Yeah, just throw it. A controlled, fast knuckle ball.

My arm lifted. I took a short breath along with my expanded chest. I drew a box in my mind. If it just grazed the borderline, I had a chance.

Fixing my gaze straight ahead, I held my breath. Making sure no vibration touched the ball.

My left hand, raised towards the sky, stretched straight forward. At the same time, I pushed the ball I was holding with my fingertips. Ensuring the ball spun as little as possible.

Whoosh-.

There was no spin felt on the ball moving through the air. In reality, it might have been spinning slowly, but until it dropped, the rotation would probably be only two or three times.

The ball, which was curving to the right, suddenly seemed to curve to the left, then plop-, it dropped.

“Whew.”

A hot feeling surged in my chest. There was no one to receive it. Still, I knew instinctively.

That the ball I just threw was a perfect knuckle ball.

And,

“Ha, this is deadly, right?”

The ball I just threw matched exactly the high-speed knuckle ball Director Yoon Sung-geun had talked about.

A massive sign came into view.

[ER Hawks Park]

And as soon as I saw that sign, my heart started to race.

This was the exclusive training ground and stadium used by the ER Hawks’ second-string (farm) team.

I’d heard the chairman of the ER Group, the owner who founded the ER Hawks, was a huge baseball fan. He must have poured a tremendous amount of money into it.

Its size was enormous for a second-tier training ground.

The stadium, which would be jaw-dropping even if the first team used it, auxiliary practice fields, a five-story clubhouse containing lodging for coaching staff and players, convenience facilities, and even an indoor training facility.

Truly, there was nothing they didn’t have.

Even though I hadn’t taken the tryout yet and didn’t even know if I could get in as a developmental player, I didn’t care.

Because I was going to pass today’s tryout no matter what.

“Whew.”

From the day Director Yoon Sung-geun visited until today, the day of the tryout, I had practiced like crazy for a whole month, cutting back on sleep.

As soon as I woke up at dawn, I’d run for two hours, then do shadow pitching until my arm hurt. After spending the daytime busily, I’d do strength training at night and throw the ball.

In the past, I would have saved my shoulder and not thrown when I was alone, but this time was an exception.

Rather, the more I threw, the more my shoulder felt strengthened. Thanks to that, I threw the ball until my arm muscles trembled violently.

And today. The long-awaited, eagerly awaited tryout day had dawned.

I wasn’t nervous. I just had to throw like I did in practice.

I confidently entered the clubhouse. Looking around, there were many players like me who had received tryout offers.

University, independent league teams, high school.

The common point among the players was that they were all wearing their respective team’s uniforms.

Another common point was that they had all been cut from the recent rookie draft.

While scanning to see if there was a familiar face, a voice was heard.

“Hello.”

I raised my head at the voice.

It was Scout Lee Jong-hwa.