Chapter 131: Chapter 29: Ace Pitchers
The seventh batter of National Academy Kugayama is named Li Fugen, his status is somewhat similar to Lin Guanglai, being a Korean descent player residing in Japan. On the team, he plays as the main second baseman, excelling primarily in defense, as offense is not his main responsibility.
For players with average hitting abilities like this, Lin Guanglai employs a strategy of quick resolution - having determined his pitching approach with Uesugi Yasuyuki, Lin Guanglai directly initiates pitching.
The first pitch, an outside fastball, is directly thrown by Lin Guanglai, and Li Fugen in the batter’s box chooses not to swing, watching the ball go by.
The umpire called this pitch a strike.
Soon after this pitch, the second pitch was again a fastball, aiming high at the inner corner of Li Fugen’s strike zone.
At such a high angle, controlling the bat becomes challenging, and Li Fugen, who is not good at hitting, naturally has no choice but to let the ball go, hoping the opposing pitcher misses the strike zone.
But Lin Guanglai is clearly not such a pitcher — the baseball is precisely controlled by him, hugging the upper border of the strike zone, drawing exclamations from the audience watching the game.
With the count at 2 strikes, all the pressure suddenly shifted onto batter Li Fugen — facing Lin Guanglai’s third pitch, Li Fugen could only helplessly perform a symbolic swing, hitting nothing but air, and Lin Guanglai easily struck him out.
Although subsequently, National Academy Kugayama’s eighth batter, catcher Kikuchi Yasushi desperately hit a single, the ninth batter, Left Fielder Kamegaya Yu’s batting pattern had long been thoroughly understood by Lin Guanglai in previous games, getting eliminated effortlessly.
"Three outs, changing sides for offense and defense!" Simultaneously with the declaration by the chief umpire, Sugai Masakazu’s excited commentary erupts from the commentary booth:
"Splendid, splendid, Lin Guanglai is just too strong!"
"Even though he pitched the entire nine innings as the starter, his performance in extra innings showed no decline — up till now, he has only been hit for five times, and has claimed a strikingly high 16 strikeouts."
"Such a player, can truly only be described as a monster with words — since the start of Summer甲, his progress speed has been as fast as a bullet train, crazily setting and breaking various records."
"I swear by my twenty years of baseball career — there is no doubt Lin is a historically significant high school player!"
Looking at the tall figure standing firm on the pitcher’s mound, Sugai Masakazu — who as a commentator now, had once taken second place at the Shengong Tournament during his player days and represented Japan twice in the Olympics — could not hide his affection for the talented player in his heart, with praises erupting unstoppably from his mouth.
There was, however, one sentence he kept to himself: In Sugai Masakazu’s view, Lin Guanglai now faintly had the tendency to rival legendary pitchers like Matsuzaka Daisuke and Yu Darvish during their high school era —
But now these two players, one is steadily developing in the Major League, the other is commanding the Nihon Professional Baseball; rashly making such remarks might incite displeasure among fans of the players, thus causing trouble for both the commentary and even Lin Guanglai himself.
Considering this, Sugai Masakazu ultimately kept those words to himself — but he was determined, from today onward, to closely follow Waseda Industries’ games:
A player of this caliber, as long as they can graduate smoothly, would certainly become the target eagerly pursued by various top baseball teams.
On the stands of Shengong Second Stadium, amidst excited neutral audiences and fervent supporters of both teams, Takekawa Jun showed no emotional fluctuations, like an outsider, continuously jotting down notes in his open notebook, seemingly documenting something.
Being a scout for the Saitama Seibu Lions, an elite team of the Japanese Professional Baseball Pacific League, Takekawa Jun has been following Lin Guanglai since his debut in the West Tokyo Conference.
During his player days, Takekawa Jun served as a pitcher for the Seibu Lions for eleven years, experiencing the tail end of the Seibu dynasty’s peak in the 80s-90s;
Upon retirement, he joined the team’s scouting department, specializing in identifying potential pitchers in the Kantou Region.
Professional baseball drafts do not emphasize high school achievements of players; they focus more on the players’ long-term development potential:
Compared to professional baseball, Takayama is like a cradle — those famous high school players might not necessarily cope with the intensity and overall environment of professional games; many renowned professional players had no significant achievements during their high school days.
Observing since summer, Takekawa Jun has been awed by Lin Guanglai’s visibly evident talent — outstanding physical gifts, pitch speeds far surpassing peers, refined and stable control techniques; crucially, he possesses an extraordinary composure!
This player seems born to be a renowned pitcher!
On the open notebook in front, it contained Takekawa Jun’s analysis of Lin Guanglai’s strengths and weaknesses currently — after categories like "Physical Talent," "Pitching Skill," and "Mental Will," Takekawa Jun rated Lin Guanglai the highest S grade.
Years of scouting experience told Takekawa Jun, this pitcher from Waseda Real is certainly a super talent on par with Matsuzaka Daisuke from 1998.