Baseball: A Two-Way Player-Chapter 464 - 85: It’s Not Over Yet!

"Swing and miss, strikeout! Batter is out!"

With the umpire’s call from behind home plate, Rakuten’s unwavering cleanup hitter Andrew Jones was struck out by Lin Guanglai.

When it all happened, there was a noticeable pause in the cheers from the home fans; even old Jones in the batter’s box was evidently dissatisfied with being struck out by three consecutive good pitches, almost barely holding back the urge to smash his bat, returning with full of anger to the dugout by home plate.

And then, fifth batter McCarthy swung at the very first pitch, sending a high flyball towards right field, easily caught by Hasegawa Yu who was guarding the right side of the field.

Including the three up, three down in the bottom of one inning, Rakuten’s batting lineup had failed to get on base consecutively for five players, including key batters like Gintei and Jones, who were completely suppressed by Lin Guanglai, not even in peak form, at the opening stage.

The performance of his own batters made Rakuten’s manager Hoshino Senichi, who was confident about securing victory before the game, feel somewhat embarrassed—looking at SoftBank’s pitching strategy for this game, it’s obvious that Lin Guanglai is consciously conserving his strength while pitching, primarily against Rakuten’s power hitters, aiming to minimize his pitch count whenever possible.

This attitude is entirely like when one’s body hasn’t recovered to peak form, trying to solve more batters in such a way.

As for a "Maddux game," Hoshino Senichi truly hadn’t considered this possibility; or in other words, aside from Lin Guanglai himself, no one else would consider the "Maddux game" angle at the very start of the game.

"Since he wants to solve more batters with as few pitches as possible, I will deliberately thwart his plan..." Hoshino Senichi thought to himself, turning to give instructions to his batting coach, "Next, let our batters foul him off, especially the batters at the tail end of the lineup—get struck out, pop up, or otherwise, but do so after consuming as many of his pitches as possible."

After saying this, he added, "Given Lin Guanglai’s current state, I estimate Akiyama will allow him no more than over 100 pitches—if that’s the case, I want him off the mound before the five innings are completed due to excessive pitch count!"

After Hoshino Senichi issued such instructions, Lin Guanglai could indeed feel the intensity of the game escalating further on the field; at least, the batters at the tail end of the lineup whom he originally thought could be easily dealt with are proving a bit tricky—it’s not because they’re significantly strong, but rather they’re adopting a passive resistance strategy against Lin Guanglai, shifting their main goal from getting base hits to exhausting the pitcher’s stamina.

Lin Guanglai indeed had to admit that this sudden change brought him some trouble initially:

Although the stamina in the first half of the game was relatively ample, and his pitching speed and power were still rapid, the consumption didn’t negatively affect Lin Guanglai’s ability to eliminate opponents, but this deliberate consumption truly reduced his efficiency.

Batters who he could previously solve with one or two pitches through groundouts or flyballs now often required more than four pitches to yield similar results—and for Lin Guanglai, whose pitch count is limited to below 100, this is not good news.

pitches spread across 9 half-innings, 27 batters, means he can afford no more than 3.7 pitches on each batter; if this continues, the best outcome would be retiring after 6-7 innings.

It’s not that Lin Guanglai does not trust his teammates, but in a do-or-die game where his team leads by only one point with a score of 1:3 disadvantage, he does indeed prefer to have the chance to determine his fate and bear the responsibility in his own hands.

The game quickly reached the bottom of the third inning. In the previous two half-innings, Lin Guanglai used 15 pitches to consecutively solve six Rakuten batters; as this half inning began, seventh batter Matsui Jatou was the first to capitalize on his tiny control error and knocked out Rakuten’s first hit of the game.

With no outs and a runner on first, Rakuten’s catcher Shima Keihiro stepped up to bat.

When engaging the opponent pitcher in a wear-out battle, batters usually focus on protecting both sides of home plate and low-angle zones in the strike zone, which is also the most common strategy for hitting fouls.

Under this premise, Lin Guanglai also chose to switch his pitching strategy, starting to attack more towards the high-angle zones of the strike zone against Rakuten batters, and Hosokawa Kei’s catcher’s mitt already placed at Shima Keihiro’s chest height, but still within the strike zone—here, would be the target of his upcoming pitch.

The vast majority of Nippon Professional Baseball batters are accustomed to swinging at pitches from waist to knee height; against high pitches within the chest to armpit range, they have to adjust their swing angle, finding it hard to exert power, often resulting in weak infield pop-ups or deflected fouls caught by the catcher, which is the breakthrough Lin Guanglai thought of suddenly thereafter.