Baseball: A Two-Way Player-Chapter 370 - 20: The Curtain Rises

Friday, March 29, 2013.

After nearly half a year of a dull period without games, as the curtain rises on the new season, the baseball feast for Nippon Professional Baseball fans is back!

The Yahoo Dome is buzzing, and the stands, which can accommodate over forty thousand fans on the opening day of professional baseball, are now completely filled.

Those who can come to the field to watch the game on a weekday evening are all loyal fans who have supported the SoftBank Team for many years. Almost every one of them is wearing the team’s supporter gear, holding various materials, turning the entire Yahoo Dome into a sea of yellow, white, and black.

Among them are some older fans, even wearing jerseys from decades ago from the Daiei Hawks or even earlier, the Nankai Hawks era. They are true veteran fans who have personally experienced the Hawks’ journey from being a bottom-tier weak team to one of the top teams in the Pacific League and the whole of Japan.

With less than half an hour left before the SoftBank Hawks vs. Rakuten Golden Eagles season opener kicks off, the stadium lights suddenly dimmed.

While the new spectators were still clueless and didn’t know what had happened, the old fans could no longer contain their excitement and turned their gaze toward the outfield stands of the Yahoo Dome.

If there’s one thing the Yahoo Dome is most famous for, it must be the "Eagle’s Vision" exclusive to the SoftBank Team. In the outfield of the Yahoo Dome, what would have been the place for the electronic scoreboard has been completely replaced by an over 50-meter long LCD screen:

When it’s game day for the SoftBank Team, this world’s largest HD-compatible display is used to play various animations supporting the team, introducing the starting lineup for the day. During the game, it’s also used to display player statistics and game data from both sides.

And now, as the Eagle’s Vision screen gradually lights up, the moment an old eagle’s sharp screech cuts through the sky above the Yahoo Dome, the stadium lights suddenly shine brightly, accompanied by bursts of majestic music. The SoftBank Team opener and the entrance of the starting nine players begin!

"First! Second baseman, Yuichi Honda!!!"

"Second! Shortstop, Kenta Imamiya!!!"

"Third! Left fielder, Seiichi Uchikawa!!!"

"Fourth! First baseman, Brandon Lahai’er!!!"

"Fifth! Third baseman, Nobuhiro Matsuda!!!"

"Sixth! Center fielder, Yuuki Yanagita!!!"

"Seventh! Right fielder, Yuya Hasegawa!!!"

"Eighth! Catcher, Toru Hosokawa!!!"

"Ninth! Pitcher, Lin Guanglai!!!"

At this moment, the stadium announcer releases his emotions instantly, and the audience cheers and applauds each SoftBank Team player, especially those superstar players who have served the team for many years. Lin Guanglai, carrying the infinite hopes of SoftBank fans, also received applause comparable to his predecessors.

When he played baseball in high school, Lin Guanglai went to Shengong Stadium, visited Koshien Stadium, and experienced the feeling of thousands of spectators cheering for him. But right now, standing in Fukuoka’s Yahoo Dome, he has to admit that playing as a high school student feels completely different from playing as a professional player, even with all his rich experience.

As SoftBank players and supporters at the Yahoo Dome celebrate the start of the new season, the broadcast teams connected to the live signal, along with their commentators, also begin their work.

In the live broadcast studio, one of the commentators for this opening game, Yohei Kune, is doing the pre-game hype.

"Hello to all the professional baseball fans, I’m commentator Yohei Kune. It’s been a while! How have you all been during the long off-season? I bet you all, like me, can’t wait for the new season to start, right?"

"Today’s game between SoftBank and Rakuten, our program invites as a commentator, a legend who served in the predecessor of the SoftBank Team, the Nankai Hawks, for 14 years, Mr. Mitsuru Fujiwara. Mr. Fujiwara, as a supporter of this team, you must be looking forward to today’s game, right?"

Getting a cue from his partner, Mitsuru Fujiwara nodded and said:

"Indeed, Mr. Kune—As a former player of this team, I am really looking forward to today’s game!"

"In my opinion, the excitement of this game lies not just in the special significance of the opening game kicking off the new season, but more importantly, that the starting pitchers for both teams today were rookies selected at the end of last season’s draft!"

"You know, the last time a rookie started on opening day in professional baseball was Takayama Mitsuru of the Yakult Swallows in 1984; and narrowing it down to the Pacific League, it was 55 years ago in 1958... Unexpectedly, just today, there are two!"

"Rakuten’s Sawamura is already a competitive graduate player, so starting due to Tanaka’s absence is not surprising for me;"

"However, for Lin, starting as a rookie high school graduate is somewhat surprising - even more surprising is that SoftBank chose to forgo the designated hitter Pena in the first game and let Lin play as a Dual Swordsmanship player... Isn’t this a bit rushed?" 𝐟𝚛𝕖𝚎𝕨𝗲𝐛𝚗𝐨𝐯𝐞𝕝.𝐜𝗼𝗺

Expressing his viewpoint, and seeing the game about to start, Mitsuru Fujiwara stopped speaking, and began his final pre-game summary:

"Of course, Lin himself is undoubtedly an exceptionally talented prodigy - perhaps that is exactly what Manager Akiyama saw in him, deciding to entrust him with such responsibility as a rookie? After all, we all know, true geniuses defy norms. Just give them a little space to perform, and they can overturn people’s perception of the game of baseball... Everything will be revealed on the field!"

After both teams’ players warmed up, amidst the cheers of over forty thousand fans at the stadium, Lin Guanglai made his professional debut on the mound. Meanwhile, the stadium broadcast played his personally chosen entrance theme music.

When he became part of the first team, the team staff consulted him about this issue, and Lin Guanglai’s choice for entrance music was simple - the theme song "Touch" from "Heroic Baseball," a classic tune known by all in Japan.

As the song ends, Lin Guanglai on the pitcher’s mound is ready, his eyes growing sharper as he looks at the batter from the Rakuten Team slowly approaching the batter’s box.