CHAPTER 40: CHAPTER 40: APPLYING PRESSURE

"Top of the first inning, Nihon University Tsurugaoka’s offense, now up to bat is the first batter, first baseman, Enomoto Yu."

As the announcement at Shengong Stadium rang out, the first inning of the finals of the West Tokyo Conference began.

Confirming the batter standing firmly in the batting box, Umpire Sakurai pointed to Lin Guanglai on the pitcher’s mound, signaling for him to start pitching.

In the fervent support from both cheering squads, the atmosphere in Shengong Stadium grew increasingly intense; yet Lin Guanglai’s heart was extraordinarily calm at this moment—holding onto this mindset, he lifted his front foot, twisted his body in preparation for the forceful throw, and accompanied by the swing of his arm, delivered the first pitch of today’s game.

Standing in the batting box beside home plate, Nihon University Tsurugaoka’s Enomoto Yu’s impression of the ball was fast—faster than what a freshman could typically throw—but more unsettling to Enomoto Yu than the speed was the ball’s angle, just hooking into the inner corner where batters find it most bothersome.

His brain quickly weighed the pros and cons, and Enomoto Yu ultimately decided to let this ball go, wanting to observe more while also buying himself and his teammates more time to adjust.

The baseball flew from Lin Guanglai’s hand, darting through the lower edge of the batter’s ball zone, and ultimately flew straight into the glove of catcher Tsuchiya Ryota behind home plate with a "bang"; simultaneously, the umpire’s judgment was heard:

"Strike, 0 balls, 1 strike."

Returning the ball from the catcher, Lin Guanglai did not rush to pitch again but instead observed the batter’s stance: the first batter was still the same as initially, preferring to stand closer to the inside of the batting box to widen the coverage during a swing.

If that’s the case, then force him to adjust his stance! Again with a smooth leg lift, powering, arm swinging, and ball gripping—the second ball was once again a fastball assaulting the batter’s inner ball zone.

This time, Enomoto Yu chose to swing, awkwardly pulling the ball out after some adjustments but hitting a foul ball.

balls, 2 strikes.

Facing the disadvantage of two strikes early in the game, Enomoto Yu hesitated and decided to move a few steps towards the outside of the batting box.

—When facing a pitcher who likes to target the inner corner and as a batter, it’s difficult to hit the ball out, such adjustments in the stance, although somewhat of a helpless choice, are nonetheless relatively effective.

Noticing the opponent’s actions, Lin Guanglai on the pitcher’s mound smiled: great, now the entire outer corner pitching space has opened up.

This is how a skilled pitcher gains an advantage against a batter:

By continuously squeezing the batter with inner corner pitches, forcing them into positions far from the home plate inside the batting box, thus opening up ample space for outer corner pitches.

Speaking of this seems simple, but this kind of pressure on the batter demands high quality from the pitcher:

If the pitcher’s control is average and cannot precisely thread a ball into the inner corner strike zone, it may lead to the downfall by walking the batter;

At worst, it causes numerous body-hit balls or even gets brutally hit out by a strong batter adept at hitting inner corner balls.

Fortunately, Lin Guanglai is not a pitcher with mere speed but poor control; on the contrary, his subtle, smooth pitching feel has always been one of his significant talents.

The coming third pitch would showcase Lin Guanglai’s control talent to everyone following the game: the baseball flew from his fingertips, darting like an arrow towards Enomoto Yu’s low outer corner.

In Enomoto Yu’s vision, this ball’s center of gravity was very low, striking at the outer corner position he’d just reluctantly abandoned.

His brain raced to think of strategies, Enomoto Yu gritted his teeth and decided to forcibly swing the bat, trying to scoop this low outer corner ball out—

Facing a 0 balls, 2 strikes situation, and the opponent pitcher’s control being incredibly accurate, Enomoto Yu dared not gamble on the possibility of a bad pitch, thus opted for an all-out strike.

To forcibly hit this low outer corner ball, Enomoto Yu’s entire posture fell apart, his body buckling down, relying on a kneeling rear leg to maintain balance—this swing was undoubtedly a miss.

"Strike, struck out." With the umpire’s judgment, Nihon University Tsurugaoka’s Enomoto Yu could only helplessly shake his head, carrying the bat back to his team’s player area.

Seeing a teammate walking towards him, Enomoto Yu shook his head and smiled wryly:

"Really no way... Waseda Jitsugyo’s freshman pitcher’s control is too good, always threading strikes into the most uncomfortable inner angle for me..."

"His approach felt different from Yamazaki from Heiri University Third, this freshman truly understands how to pressure batters... You guys better be careful, he’s really tough to handle..."

Soon, other players from Nihon University Tsurugaoka would experience the feel of their first batter.

Facing the second batter Sato Hide, who excels at bunting, Lin Guanglai, after communicating with Tsuchiya Ryota, decided to increase the proportion of bait pitches in the distribution.

After some entanglement, the field situation reached 2 balls, 2 strikes.

On the mound, Lin Guanglai adjusted his grip slightly, then feigned to throw the ball, the red-white baseball rapidly spinning towards the home plate.

From Sato Hide’s perspective, the pitcher’s control was off this time, and the ball trajectory was too high.

"Such an obvious bad pitch, was probably a mistake?" Thinking like this, in the batting box, Sato Hide selected away from this pitch, lowering his raised bat and stepping back from the box.

Unexpectedly, something completely unforeseen happened:

Just as the "bad pitch" was about to dart into the catcher’s glove above the strike zone, the force pushing the baseball upwards seemed to suddenly vanish, gravity pulling the ball frantically downward—"bang," Tsuchiya Ryota, crouched behind the plate, caught the ball.

"Strike, struck out." Until the umpire’s call echoed again, the struck-out Sato Hide woke as if from a dream:

He was fooled by this freshman pitcher, this was no bad pitch, it was clearly a uniquely large displacement vertical curveball!

Returning solemnly to the player area, Sato Hide shook his head at Mita Iketsu, his team’s soon-to-bat third batter:

"Honestly, this freshman’s capability exceeded expectations; be wary of his breaking balls, based on both our collected data and my experience, he loves to throw a breaking ball upon gaining two strikes."

Mita Iketsu nodded in agreement, grasped his bat, and headed into the field. Standing firm in the batting box, ready for the strike.

Facing the opposing lineup’s core batter, Lin Guanglai initially threw two balls to probe, the result acceptable to both, 1 strike, 1 ball.

Mita Iketsu’s ability to select and chase fastballs was strong, truly befitting a core batter; but despite his prowess, Lin Guanglai managed to pinpoint some flaws in the first two probes:

Mita Iketsu’s batting stance was very traditional, liking to lift his front foot high while charging on—this batting form, although effective against fastballs, seems powerless against change-ups.

Having determined the upcoming pitching strategy, Lin Guanglai communicated with Tsuchiya Ryota via hand signals, and the counterpart acknowledged understanding.

Due to his not-so-refined mastery of the change-up, Lin Guanglai did not immediately unleash it, instead, he engaged the batter further with regular pitches.

When the situation reached 3 balls, 2 strikes, full count, Lin Guanglai nodded towards the baseline Tsuchiya Ryota, following the initial plan, delivered the decisive change-up.

Faced with this change-up with nearly a 20km/h speed gap and similar pitching posture to a four-seam fastball, by the time Mita Iketsu reacted, his batting rhythm had been thoroughly disrupted, ultimately unable to escape a swing and a miss.

"Three outs, sides switch."

Thus ended the top half of the first inning, with three batters, three strikeouts, freshman Lin Guanglai kicked off Waseda Jitsugyo’s finals with a most unexpected freshman performance.