Chapter 576 – Episode 568. Ace vs Ace. (2)
-No. 1 hitter, Kim Joo-yeop. Batter number 1, Kim Joo-yeop.
[No. 1 batter Kim Joo-yeop enters the batter’s box. Kim Joo-yeop, he performed well this season, right?]
[Yes. He played for the AT Thunders until the year before last, but after joining the Hwasan Falcons as a free agent last year, he is playing a good role as the undisputed number one hitter and spearhead.]
[Kim Joo-yeop’s regular season performance is .301 7 ri, OPS 0.797. He scored 113 runs, hit 6 home runs, and stole 21 bases.]
‘Kim Joo-yeop, a typical contact-type No. 1 hitter who recorded .301, 7 ri, and 21 stolen bases. But the Bolsambi is not that high at 0.505. And he failed to steal 13 bases, so his base running isn’t that great. Although he had over 20 doubles, he also had only 6 home runs, which wasn’t that many. His favorite ball is the high ball.’
Bottom of the first inning, volcano attack. When leadoff hitter Kim Joo-yeop entered the game, information about Kim Joo-yeop quickly passed through Wonho’s mind. Before entering the game, he had already done all the analysis and decided how he would play against them, but now it is the fall baseball stage. After carefully checking to see if he had missed anything, Wonho sent a sign to the catcher.
‘Senior, let’s hit the first pitch toward the body.’
After checking the information about the opponent once again, the ball that Wonho chose was a high ball that Kim Joo-yeop would like. It was a choice that was made based on the judgment that Kim Joo-yeop could be sufficiently defeated with his pitch.
‘It’s hard to predict that your favorite ball will come from the first pitch. If you don’t expect it, Kim Joo-yeop’s bat speed won’t be able to catch my ball.’
And the catcher nodded at Wonho’s choice.
In fact, it was not common for a pitcher to sign autographs like Wonho does now in professional games. Basically, unless the catcher was outstanding, the battery coach would issue an autograph, and in some cases, the manager would issue an autograph depending on the situation.
However, Wonho was not that typical pitcher.
Wonho’s current position is that of the team’s ace, who is completely trusted. Starting from the second half of this season, the coach increasingly left the ball mix to the battery in Wonho’s games, and Wonho was showing good performance as the coach expected.
… Like right now.
Perfect!
[Ah, Kim Joo-yeop’s first pitch hit! It floats high in the infield. Second baseman Park Cheol-young. Catch it. One out.]
[Kim Joo-yeop threw the ball high toward his body, which he likes, but he lost power, right? If he bats first, he has to watch the ball a lot, and since it is his favorite ball, he has no choice but to swing the bat.]
[The first pitch was 154 km/h. The ball was very good, right?]
[Actually, there aren’t many pitchers who throw pitches that batter like, right? However, because Kim Won-ho is throwing this kind of ball, he must have been confident that he could overwhelm the batter, right?]
[Now, second batter Lee Won-hyung comes to bat. His performance this season is .206 with a batting average of 0.743, 10 home runs and 7 stolen bases.]
After catching Kim Joo-yeop with the first pitch, the batter who came to bat was Hwasa’s second baseman Won-hyung Lee, who was the main culprit of the upset elimination due to a decisive error in last year’s playoffs.
‘It will definitely go up this fall.’
As he was accused of being the main culprit for being eliminated from fall baseball last year, Lee Won-hyung was quite desperate for this fall.
… However,
“Strike!”
“Strike!”
“Jitterbug! Strike! Out!”
[Swing strikeout! Kim Won-ho strikes out with a splitter! Three pitches, three strikes!]
Baseball was not a sport where you could hit a home run or get on base with just your heart.
A splitter thrown after two high fastballs. It was an obvious ball, and Lee Won-hyung also swung his bat, anticipating the ball, but he couldn’t even touch Won-ho’s ball.
“Senior, how do you like the ball?”
“First, the splitter angle is the best today. “It’s probably the day the splitter gets scratched.”
“Okay. I understand.”
Although he retreated helplessly, he still discovered that the splitter was good, so Lee Won-hyung shared the information he had discovered with Choi Si-woo, the third hitter, and returned to the plate.
[Now, Choi Si-woo is the number 3 batter at bat. This season, he posted a batting average of .296, an OPS of 0.971, 38 home runs, and 117 RBI.]
[Is it safe to say that Choi Si-woo is now the best first baseman in the league along with Choi Jin-cheol and Koo Jin-mo? With 38 home runs this season, the second highest in the league, the Golden Glove is likely?]
-Choi Si-woo! Siwoo Choi! Choi Si-woo!
Two out counts in the bottom of the first inning within a few minutes of the attack starting. However, the voices of Hwasan fans were full of anticipation. Because the batter who came out to bat was Choi Si-woo, who has become the best first baseman in the league.
Choi Si-woo, who revealed his presence to fans by hitting 27 home runs in 2023 and 32 home runs in 2024, showed off his talent by hitting 38 home runs this season, and is now the best player in the league, beating seniors like Choi Jin-cheol and Koo Jin-mo. He was evaluated as a first baseman.
‘Today’s deciding ball is likely to be a splitter, so I need to be aggressive and avoid crowding as much as possible. The first pitch today had a high fastball rate, right? Then, it’s a fastball.’
The method Choi Si-woo chose was to actively target pitchers.
There were cases where some fans told him to at least pull out a ball against an ace pitcher, but he knew from experience that such a passive approach would end up with a pitcher like Kim Won-ho who would rush to hit after the count was over, so Choi Si-woo used this method. I believed that this was the best choice.
When Choi Si-woo finished preparing to hit, with good timing, Kim Won-ho also finished mixing the balls and was preparing to throw the first pitch.
[Kim Won-ho’s first pitch!]
And the first pitch flew. Seeing the ball that felt fast, Si-Woo Choi was inwardly delighted, and he swung the bat as he had already thought.
Perfect!
But the hitting sound doesn’t feel very good. The moment he hit the ball, Choi Si-woo realized that he had forgotten one thing.
‘Two-seam!’
Kim Won-ho’s two-seam running to the outside based on himself as a left-handed hitter… He tried to forcibly pull the ball that hit the tip of the bat…,
[Choi Si-woo’s batted ball! The second baseman is waiting! Three out. End of inning!]
The result is an infield ground ball.
[Hey, it’s totally General Meng. Seong Hyun finished the inning in 7 runs, and Kim Won-ho finished the inning in 5 runs against him. I think it will be a fierce pitching battle today, right?]
Game 1, which was highly anticipated as a match between the two teams’ aces, was shaping up to be a pitcher’s battle from the first inning. And that atmosphere continued.
[… Swing strikeout! … Looking strikeout! … Swing strikeout! Seonghyun ends the inning with KKK!]
[After all, you’re Seonghyeon, right? The atmosphere could have been overshadowed by Kim Won-ho’s good pitching, but like an experienced Seong-hyun, he struck out three batters in a row, showing his will not to lose the initiative, right?]
[… Yonggi hit! This batted ball passes between the second baseman and the shortstop! Lee Yong-gi records the first hit of today’s game! … McD’s batted ball! Second baseman! Shortstop! First baseman! Double play! Park Cheol-young’s solid defense! The out count goes up by two at once! … A high batted ball. Right fielder Han Dong-sik catches it. Three out!]
As the two pitchers faced off in the first game of the playoffs, the baseball community was also heating up.
-Wow, what the fuck is this pitcher’s battle? It’s not going to cleanse my eyes lol
┗ㄹㅇ I guess the two of you will complete the game?
┗Neither Volcano nor Silla are teams with weak batting skills, but they are just tied down haha
┗Watching the pitching match between the two, I once again feel that the Doodle Dog fan’s fierce self-defense is great evenly against the two…
┗┗ㅇㅅㅁㅎㅅ
┗┗ㅇㅅㅁㅎㅅ
┗┗Surprise worship of the fierce god of defenseㄷㄷ
-Surely Seonghyeon is Seonghyun and Kim Won-ho is also Kim Won-ho. ㅅㅂ Doesn’t our team have an ace like that?
┗Looking at the post, I’m a Mirae fan, but the team that holds Jang Woo-joo is Btickkekekekekeke
┗Ha, we also have an ace like this, so we’ll be there next year, right? Longs, let’s win this season and go to the major haha
┗┗Btick is disgusting
-Is Seonghyeon and Kim Won-ho’s pitcher’s battle real? My heart feels majestic haha
-Hmm, it certainly seems like the pitcher who will continue Seonghyeon’s lineage is Kim Won-ho rather than Jang Woo-joo. First, the way he throws in the fall is absolutely ace.
┗You can just praise the players on your team. Why do you criticize Woo Joo?
┗┗Honestly, isn’t it true that Jang Woo-joo didn’t show anything in the fall?
┗┗So who was the pitcher in last year’s Olympic finals? Jang Woo-joo, right? Director Lee Geum-hyun is not an idiot, and there must be a reason why he ranked Jang Woo-joo over Seong-hyeon and Kim Won-ho.
┗Honestly, isn’t Seonghyun just another one? 98 wins in the major leagues is nothing. Seonghyun, who played for the Dodgers and Yankees, looks like a dick haha
┗┗Kim Won-ho also seems capable of making the majors, right? The highest velocity is 158, and from what I have seen, slalom, spool, and two-seam are unconditionally successful.
┗┗Haha, why don’t you say go? Seonghyun: When he was young, he was obsessed with the league, but honestly, Kim Won-ho wasn’t that bad, right?
┗┗Is the league level the same as it is now with Ji Maeng-ho?
┗┗Even with Ji Maeng-ho, old Seong-hyun has a better record than young Kim Won-ho?
In terms of name value, Seonghyun is far superior, but the fact that Kim Won-ho is also holding out his business card is enough to show how much influence the confrontation between the two is having on baseball fans.
The debate, which seemed like it would end only when someone conceded a point, showed no signs of ending,
[Lee Eun-chong gets a walk! In the top of the 4th inning, Silla Triggers reaches base for the first time today. … Park Cheol-young’s hit was a ground ball to shortstop. Three out. Seong-Hyeon allowed himself to get on base, but ended the inning easily. … Kim Won-ho ends episode 4 with a three-way comeback!]
Even in the 4th inning when the batters faced their second at-bat,
[… Three out again! Seonghyeon concludes episode 6. It still looks the same! … Kim Won-ho puts the leadoff hitter on base, but ends the inning without allowing a run! Kim Won-ho is also thoroughly blocking Hwasan’s batting lineup!]
Even in the 6th inning, when the pitchers’ stamina was slowly decreasing, the two pitchers showed an iron wall and were blocking the opposing batters.
But in the top of the 7th inning,
[Seonghyeon is still on the mound. Park Cheol-young got his third chance at bat. Who will be the winner of this match? … You hit the fifth ball, and it lands in front of right field! The first leadoff hitter on base in today’s game!]
The atmosphere in the stadium began to become strange as Seong-Hyeon, who had been a tough man, allowed the leadoff hitter to get on base for the first time in this game.
