Baseball: A Two-Way Player-Chapter 381 - 30: First Pro Showdown

Ohtani Shohei is a player that Lin Guanglai, as his friend and rival, knows all too well: Past experiences repeatedly tell him one thing—that Ohtani Shohei is definitely a difficult batter to face.

It’s not that his current raw strength is exceptionally strong; in fact, whether it’s Ohtani Shohei or Lin Guanglai, both are highly anticipated genius high school graduates, but ultimately they are still "semi-finished products" that have yet to fully realize their potential, and there is still quite a long way for them to grow into core players who can stand alone for a team.

The main reason Lin Guanglai says he is difficult to deal with is that either one of them knows the other far too well:

In high school, the two faced off quite a bit—besides a formal confrontation in the Summer League of 2011, because the Tohoku and Kantou regions are relatively close, Hanamaki East and Waseda Jitsugyo also arranged to play quite a few practice matches thereafter;

Additionally, in the Japan U18 national team, the two were also teammates and roommates, and during training and matches, they often exchanged various insights on pitching and batting.

It can be said that Lin Guanglai’s understanding of Ohtani Shohei’s technical characteristics even surpasses that of Softbank First Team’s professional analysis team in certain aspects, as they don’t have firsthand feedback from the players themselves; vice versa, it’s the same.

This kind of good personal relationship, at this moment, instead becomes a weakness that can be exploited: No matter how powerful Lin Guanglai’s pitches are today, no matter how precise his control is today, if Ohtani Shohei can always predict the pitch type and trajectory based on his habits, hitting the ball is only a matter of time.

Of course, conversely, Lin Guanglai can also use Ohtani Shohei’s understanding of his habits and go against it, and this is likewise a viable strategy, which is exactly what he plans to do.

Just in time, with nearly half a year of professional-level training, he has some new pitches that he has not unveiled—facing such an old friend and old rival who has an extremely thorough understanding of him, Lin Guanglai thinks it’s time to test the effectiveness in actual combat.

Kei Hosokawa in the catcher’s seat signals, and Lin Guanglai nods in agreement before closing his glove, preparing to pitch; meanwhile, Hosokawa Kei, after issuing the pitch instruction, also moved slightly towards Ohtani Shohei’s left-handed inside corner, opening his glove to prepare for the catch.

With a swift motion, as the arm swings, the baseball launched from Lin Guanglai’s fingertips, assaulted low inside into Ohtani Shohei’s direction—the match has lasted for more than two innings, Lin Guanglai’s body is completely warmed up, and he pours all the strength accumulated in his body into this pitch, sending the white small ball barreling towards home plate at a terrifying speed.

For a typical batter, upon seeing such a pitch at first glance, not to mention hitting a safe hit, they might not even entertain the thought of swinging the bat.

But Ohtani Shohei is no ordinary person!

In the eyes of others, this ball speed might be considered as unprecedentedly fast, but for him, this is a ball he has seen and experienced firsthand countless times—aiming at the incoming ball, adjusting his body, gathering strength, the baseball bat in Ohtani Shohei’s hands swung down fully towards the low inside position in the next second.

"Thak!!!"

With this crisp sound of bat meeting ball, the volume inside Sapporo Dome immediately surged, even though the baseball, amidst everyone’s gaze, flew towards the stands on the side of first base, the enormous volume showed no sign of abating.

"Shohei! Come on! You can do it! Hit the ball into the stands for us!"

"The first pitch was hit so well, for the next one make sure to focus and hit!!!"

"Stop that guy’s streak of strikeouts at 7! Don’t let him continue!!!"

"Come on, come on! Japan’s pride, my pride—it’s all on you!!!"

Watching the baseball flying into the stands, Ohtani Shohei clicked his tongue and showed a slightly regretful expression, obviously regretting that he couldn’t keep the ball inside the field.

On this pitch, his feeling of swinging was quite good, and his exertion state was great—but Lin Guanglai’s ball indeed carried heaviness, even when struck by the bat, it still pressured him.

Even when they were teammates, Ohtani Shohei had expressed his envy for Lin Guanglai’s pitch heaviness more than once:

The main reason that he himself has yet to take the mound in the first team is that while his pitch speed is fast enough, the quality of the ball is too light, and the sense of pressure it induces on batters in actual matches doesn’t quite measure up to the numbers.

From the pitcher’s mound, seeing the baseball ultimately flying into the stands, Lin Guanglai also let out a slight sigh of relief: this pitch indeed had a bit of a gamble, but fortunately, the outcome was good, his aims of scoring good counts and demonstrating against the batter were achieved.

Yet, after gaining the advantage of one good count, Lin Guanglai then threw two consecutive bad pitches: a high zone fastball outside and an inside slider both failed to land within the strike zone, relinquishing the count advantage he held just moments before.

Seeing the opposing pitcher throw two consecutive bad pitches, the cheers in Sapporo Dome grew louder; compared to this match, what the Ham Team fans care about now is more likely Lin Guanglai’s attempt to pursue consecutive strikeout records—according to their thinking, you might set this record against the other 10 teams, we wouldn’t object, might even applaud; but if the victim becomes their home team, sorry, absolutely not!

A safe hit or drawing a walk, anything to stop him from continuing to strikeouts!

Ham Team’s fans hadn’t been happy for long when on the next pitch, Lin Guanglai managed to regain the pitching rhythm: a fastball pinpointed low outside the strike zone, Ohtani Shohei did not swing, and the umpire called a strike.

For the fifth time in this inning, Lin Guanglai received the returned baseball from Kei Hosokawa, faced with the gestures made by the opponent, Lin Guanglai shook his head in rare disagreement; Hosokawa Kei behind home plate continued altering hand gestures, until he finally confirmed the pitch type his pitcher desires for this turn.

Despite his reservations about the choice, as a catcher who prioritizes the pitcher’s personal will, Kei Hosokawa agreed to Lin Guanglai’s request.

After a seamlessly connected pitching motion, the baseball was thrown—at the same time, from home plate, Ohtani Shohei was already prepared and ready, judging from the trajectory, this pitch was undoubtedly a fastball.

Aim at the incoming ball, swing the bat with all might!

"Swish—!!!"

The expected sensation of the bat hitting the baseball did not arrive, instead, it was a swing and miss.

When the swung bat returned to its position behind him, Ohtani Shohei realized that once again, he had been tricked this time!

"Change-up!!!"

"Lin Guanglai! After laying groundwork with consecutive fastballs, he used a change-up to finish the fight!"

"This is also his 8th strikeout of the game! Attention, this is eight consecutive strikeouts!"

"Next, 1 more strikeout to tie the record; 2 more strikeouts to make history!"

"The end monster of the Heisei era, Takayama’s record smasher, having been on the professional stage for just a few months—"

"Now, he is facing history once again!"