Chapter 55 – Episode 55. 2022 Finish Camp (1)

One month passed quickly. In the meantime, my daily life has flowed without change.

After working out, I hit rice cakes with Hyuna, Hyejin noona, Joeun, and sometimes exorcism with Soyeong. After spending a month like that, the AT Thunders finished the season with a ranking of 7th.

And November. I got to participate in the AT Thunders’ finish camp.

“Hi? Lee Ki-chul, who joined the AT Thunders as the second-team battery coach from this season. Nice to meet. Let’s get along.”

“”Hello!””

And the most disgusting coach, Ki-cheol, joined the AT Thunders as a battery coach for the 2nd team. I heard about it from Hyejin noona, but seeing the guy’s face here, I didn’t feel very good.

‘A disgusting bastard. You followed me all the way here.’

Of course, I won’t be joining the 2nd Army after finish camp, so this is probably the last time I see you.

“Now, it seems that the introduction of the coaches is roughly over, so come and introduce the rookies.”

After the introductions of the coaches, 2nd team coach Lee Soo-hyun called the new players who joined this year.

“Uh, from the first nomination. Ji Maeng-ho.”

“Hello. This is Hanche High School Ji Maeng-ho. I was born in 2003 because I was an infielder and had a one-year delay.”

Clap clap clap, applause is heard. Will this be enough?

“End with that? Kids these days have no ambition.”

However, Lee Soo-hyun was somewhat dissatisfied.

“Yes?”

“Talent Show! Talent Show!”

And the players sitting in front began to shout with their mouths together. Talent Show? I didn’t prepare anything….

‘Mr. Rossby? What should I do?’

‘Why do you ask me that? Hurry up and show off your talents as the seniors tell you to do.’

Rossby also betrayed me with an expectant look on his face. Fuck. I don’t have….

“I can’t show it here because baseball is a skill, but I will show it with my skills on the ground.”

I decided to just push through.

“Oh, cheap.”

“Yes, if it’s the first nomination, you should have this kind of skills.”

“What are you doing bastard? If the senior is black, he should.”

Various reactions. Yes, bark It’s because I’m different from you 2nd Army anyway.

Due to the nature of the finish camp, most of the players here were second-team players. The first team players went on vacation to commemorate the end of the season. Well, there were some 1.5 team level players and unexpected people.

“Stop, stop.”

It was not coach Lee Soo-hyun who stopped the players, but Woo Kwan-hyung, an unexpected person.

Woo Kwan-hyung, currently the oldest member of the AT Thunders, appeared like a comet as a high school graduate rookie in 2002 and was the heart of the AT Thunders, which is still defending the AT Thunders after 21 seasons.

In other words, ‘The King of No Crowns.’ Compared to his staggering career record, he had no titles and no championship rings.

‘Why did such a player come to the finish camp?’

It was common for seniors like that to take a break without coming to the finish camp, but it seemed like they were participating in the finish camp as well as being the embodiment of self-management.

“Yes, if chess is baseball, you might want to show it as baseball. Let’s see, who’s the next 2nd 1st?”

Thanks to Woo Kwan-hyung’s intervention, I went back to my seat without a talent show. As soon as I returned to my seat, the next batter stepped forward.

“That’s me! My name is Hwiyungo pitcher, Lim Joon-hoo. I hope to go along well! The highest velocity has ever been shot up to 152.”

Hwiyungo’s Lim Jun-hu, who beat us in the presidential boat, is a guy with good energy, so he keeps sending me private messages, but I remember replying with a short answer.

“Oh, yes, Lim Jun-hoo. Welcome to AT.”

“I prepared a song for my talent show!”

And Lim Jun-hoo started singing the prepared song. Taking advantage of that gap, I approached Woo Kwan-hyung.

“Thank you for your help. Seniors.”

“To help. But be careful, no matter how talented you are, you have to play baseball while keeping basic etiquette.”

… Is it a kkondae style? Once confirmed.

After that, the new players started to introduce themselves one after another, and all 11 draftees, including me, finished introducing themselves.

“Yes, there was one guy who signed up as the last player to report, so come out and see. Jeong Hwi-cheol?”

“Hello, seniors! This is Gunsan Technical High School Jeong Hwi-cheol. The position is an outfielder! I’ll do my best! Take good care of me.”

Jeong Hwi-cheol, did he also join the team? I remember him as the guy who caught my home run in the phoenix game. The image of him sitting down and shedding tears after being hit with a come-from-behind home run by me at the end is also vivid.

“Yes, since I came in as a reporter, I have to work harder than my other classmates. You know?”

“I know! I’ll do my best!”

“Yeah, you go in with a talent show too.”

“Ugh….”

The guy shuddered and started singing a trendy idol song. Did I do that too?

‘Why? Were you scared?’

‘It’s scary. It’s just that he does it, but I don’t.

‘I was scared.’

‘Yes, yes. Think whatever you like.’

After Jeong Hwi-cheol’s song, Lee Soo-hyun clapped his hands and drew attention from the players.

“Okay, then everyone goes to their lodgings, unpacks, and gathers in 30 minutes. Got it? I get along well with my roommates because I have to share the same room for two weeks. Then dissolve. Room assignments are posted in the dorm hallway.”

“”Dissolution!””

Should I say the downside of finish camp? If I had to pick one downside of the finish camp, it was that I had to be confined to a dormitory at a facility in District 2 in Icheon for two weeks.

Besides, I was the youngest here, and I, who shared a room with someone, had to do the laundry and chores, and running away like a school was unthinkable.

‘Please, don’t get caught by the strange bastard.’

After two weeks of finishing camp, I headed to the hallway of the dormitory where room assignments were written with my suitcase to check on my roommate.

“Hey, I envy you!”

“What? And I’m the older brother, hey? Are you crazy?”

“How are you, it’s Dongkyu.”

After confirming the room assignment, Lim Jun-hu patted me on the shoulder and started talking to me. What are you envious of?

[No. 204: Woo Kwan-hyung, Ji Maeng-ho.]

Fuck! Why do you have to be the best! When I looked around, Woo Kwan-hyung was also looking at me.

“Let’s try our best.”

“Yes, senior.”

Looking at it earlier, he seemed a bit like an old man…. Can I hold out for two weeks?

*

“So you’re going to share a room with him?”

“Yes. I want to teach you while I am with you for two weeks.”

Haha, ok. Kwan-hyung, if you stick with a senior like you, everyone will learn something.”

A few days before the AT Thunders wrap-up camp started, Lee Soo-hyeon, the second-team coach of the AT Thunders, and Woo Kwan-hyung, the oldest AT Thunders, were having a conversation.

“Looking at the interview, you don’t usually look like a nerd, but can you do it?”

“I have to try.”

Ji Maeng-ho, a large-scale rookie who made an eye contact with seniors with an unprecedented interview at the rookie nomination ceremony and became a hot topic among fans. Woo Kwan-hyung’s proposal was welcome to Lee Soo-hyun, who was already thinking about what to do with this guy.

‘A veteran of the same rank would be able to remodel the mind.’

The embodiment of self-management, synonymous with persistence. A collection of professionalism. It was Lee Soo-hyun who believed that if it was Woo-gwan-hyung, it wouldn’t be a task to remodel a cheeky newcomer.

‘It’s trustworthy if it’s a coffin.’

In 2002, the last season he spent with the AT Thunders, the young Woo Kwan-hyung, who debuted as a rookie and worked tirelessly, was the basis for that belief.

Woo Kwan-hyung Who is he?

Who comes to mind when you think of AT Thunders? A player who comes to mind without question. AT Thunders NO. 10, it will be right-handed. The most famous nickname that modifies him is ‘Heart of Thunder’.

Well, there were other famous nicknames like ‘My Brother’ and ‘Gwan-woo’ that fans called, but the official nickname was ‘Heart of Thunders’ anyway. And living up to that nickname, he was the representative of the AT Thunders in the 2000s.

Woo Kwan-hyung, who debuted as a high school graduate rookie in 2002 as a representative of the AT Thunders and played only for the AT Thunders for 21 seasons until 2022, the reason why he participated in the finishing camp where only second-tier players participate was simple.

The desire to win right away! No, even if it’s not a championship, I’m eager to go to fall baseball!

Even when he debuted as a rookie in 2002 and won the semi-playoff MVP and playoff MVP, and went up to the Korean Series, Kwan-hyeong thought this season was his season.

However, Kwan-hyung’s dream was thwarted after he hit a reversal home run. Even so, Kwan-hyung thought that he could challenge the throne again at any time.

But the world wasn’t so kind. Because Kwan-hyeong was not even given the opportunity to challenge the throne, let alone the throne.

Kwan Hyung, who announced his debut as a special rookie by hitting 115 hits and 13 home runs with a batting average of 0.303 in the first season, achieved his first 20 home runs and 20 stolen bases in 2004, and since then, he has represented the KBA through 20 home runs and 20 stolen bases seven times. It has become a byword for the Hotajun tribe.

While playing for 21 seasons with the AT Thunders, he recorded 2587 appearances, 2955 hits, 389 home runs, and 394 stolen bases. 11 Golden Gloves earned by outfielders and designated hitters. In particular, he has never hit 30 home runs, but the 389 home runs he hit was a part that made it possible to know the consistency of Woo Kwan-hyung.

In addition, he recorded 0.317 / 0.383 / 0.507 / 0.890 in batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage, and OPS, so beautiful that it was impossible to think of a hitter using Jamsil.

Woo Kwan-hyung’s records were records that could only be described as brilliant. He has never held a title holder, but he has a record that can only be achieved by persevering.

However, such a brilliant record was a factor that made Kwan-hyeong more reviled, who had not been able to even go near the fall baseball, let alone win.

A guy with no teamwork. The guy who only thinks about personal records, the demon, the dark energy, the schizo, the king of no arms, and so on.

In addition, last year, his 30% batting average, which he had been recording for 20 consecutive seasons, was broken, and he was told by fans to retire.

-‘Woo Gwan-hyung is out of fashion. It is sediment. The team survives only when you abandon that bastard. Woo Kwan-hyung is blocking the blood of the AT Thunders. How long are you going to use an old man as a designated hitter? You have to nurture a rookie.’

The coffin type wanted to prove it. He knows he’s not dead yet. I wanted to break through the criticism of the fans in a good way.

That’s why I participated in the finishing camp to develop my physical strength, which gradually decreases as I get older.

And I wanted to make the fans who love AT train harder than usual this winter feel the hot fall baseball feeling that I felt when I was a rookie again.

However, in order to go to fall baseball, it was impossible to do it alone.

‘Of course, it’s not that our team’s players are bad.’

Kwan-hyung was not worried about the sluggish performance of the AT Thunders. If you look at AT Thunders’ squad, it’s because the name value alone is not inferior to other teams.

Of course, there were no players who dominated the league, but at the end of the season, individual performances were good enough that 3 or 4 players were nominated for the Golden Gloves.

However, off-beat baseball, which is unique to AT Thunders, has always held back the footsteps of fall baseball. If the batting line and starters are good, the bullpen. If the starting lineup and bullpen are good, the batting line is good, and if the starting line and bullpen are good, starting lineup! And the injuries of key players popping up on the road of fall baseball!

As fans say, the past 21 years of the AT Thunders have been unlucky enough that it is not an exaggeration to say that a dark energy surrounds the AT Thunders.

Because of that, the AT Thunders always suffered the loss of fall baseball.

I always started the season saying ‘this year is different!’, But the result was 6th or 7th. The team was gradually sucked into the deep pit of the dark age as it continued to record ambiguous rankings that did not benefit from the rookie draft and could not even go to fall baseball.

‘One player is not enough to change a team like this.’

Kwan-hyung was also a superstar who was counted on one hand when talking about the KBA, but the dream of fall baseball, which was impossible with Kwan-hyung alone.

To make that dream come true, they needed a game changer that could change the game. Usually, in baseball, game changers could be an ace who throws a fastball or a home run hitter who can change the atmosphere of a game.

In order to become such a player, Kwan Hyeong-do also tried to change his swing style to a 30-homerun style, but the result was his worst record since his debut, ruining his first free agency.

And watching the team’s superstar, Kwan-hyung, transform into a geopo and go bankrupt, the club no longer prefers a geopo type hitter. Continuous vicious cycle.

‘Maybe it’s true that I ruin the team. Since that season, the club has become passive towards big guns type hitters.’

If he had succeeded by transforming into a giant cannon, would the team’s constitution have changed? It was meaningless, even assuming. Because he failed

So Maeng-ho Ji, a promising player who joined the team after a long time, hoped that he would not follow the same path as himself. He wanted to pass on everything to Ji Maeng-ho, who could be the club’s last primary nomination. How to prepare before the season starts, how to manage physical strength, how to overcome a slump, and so on.

As a result, he went to the coach of the 2nd division and asked to share a room with Ji Maeng-ho during the finishing camp.

And now that finish camp has begun.

“Take good care of me. Seniors.”

Ji Maeng-ho stood in front of Kwan-hyung.