Chapter 786 – Episode 773. Best Talent. (1)
“Look at the rotation, it’s vicious. It’s vicious.”
Someone watching the Skins video mutters. Vicious rotation. That was correct. Placing the Skins behind Cortés was a very vicious arrangement. Generally, when a team plans a pitcher rotation, they tend not to add similar types if they can afford it. If you adapt to the previous pitcher, you may be hit hard when a similar pitcher comes out the next day.
And Cortes, who threw the ball the day before, and Skins, who threw the ball today, were very different types.
Cortes and Skins were very different in almost every respect, including the difference between left and right-handed pitchers, pretty pitching form and amateurish pitching form, and ball velocity. Moreover, if there is a large difference in velocity between the two, the effect is maximized.
Cortes was a player who threw the ball at about the average speed in the league, but Skins was the player who threw the fastest ball in the league, so the difference in average speed between the two players was almost 10 km/h.
Probably, it would be difficult to get used to watching Cortes’ ball and then seeing Skins’ ball.
“Well, until last year, it was easier to hit Ness’ ball because the Skins were in front.”
“It was like that. No matter how strange the pitching form is, if the ball looks slow, it won’t be effective.”
“Nestor is performing well this season. There were also skins injuries.”
It certainly seemed like the other batters were worried as well.
“But do the Skins throw the ball that well? If you look at the records, it’s not that bad, right?”
However, it was true that the performance that Skins was showing this year and the performance that he showed until last year was not untouchable, so it was true that there were questions about why he was doing this. He was the type to hit a lot of home runs, and last year was a career-high season, but 14 wins at 2.89 were disappointing results for him to aim for Cy Young.
“Well, on average, yes. But last year, when we met, he pitched a complete game with 2 hits and 15 strikeouts? “If you look at his high points, he’s a terrifying guy.”
“Ah… That style?”
However, the problem was that, like all fastball pitchers, they were afraid of getting scratched. His career strikeouts to date are 719. He only pitched 566.1 innings and recorded that many strikeouts, and his strikeouts per 9 innings were 11.43, the highest in the league since his debut.
Is this a pitcher with a clear peak? Of course, that high point may not always be maintained, but it was natural for the players to be worried because that high point could have hit today in the game against us.
“Don’t worry too much though. “The Skins guy is still limited to 70 pitches.”
The batting coach must have felt that kind of atmosphere and tried to brighten the mood.
‘Somehow. It’s in the early 3-point range, but it doesn’t seem like there’s much to win. I guess there is a limit of 70.’
As the coach said, I checked the power analysis sheet and found that the Skins were currently under the 70-pitch limit. Does he feel like he is being cared for not long after he was injured?
“He’s definitely a fastball pitcher, so you have to be careful about injuries. “I missed it at the beginning of this season because of my elbow.”
“Well, actually, even if there is no limit to 70 pitches, if you just collect runners, you can end up destroying yourself.”
“Yes, of course. Even if it’s a scratched day, you can just subtract a few pitches.”
“So, Ji.”
“Yes, coach.”
“If he gets scratched today, he can ask for more pitches, right?”
In Korea, there were many cases where the hitting coach told me about the hitting direction of today’s game, but for almost the first time, the hitting coach asked me how I should play today. It appears that such cases are not common in the United States, and he looks slightly sorry.
“Well, you can do it.”
Of course, I was used to it, so I willingly nodded to the hitting coach’s request. There were many cases like this in Korea as well. And the batting coach’s expression brightens at my answer.
‘Anyway, there are so many ups and downs in America. The coach makes this request so difficult. Tsk, when I become captain, I have to change this whole culture.’
As I looked around with that thought in mind, the other batters’ expressions were still stiff. It seems like there’s a lot of worry about today’s game. As expected, at times like this…
“Ah! But it’s easy for me, but what if it gets scratched by other hitters?”
To be honest, my hitting timing was a little off after meeting Cortés, so I wasn’t particularly confident. Moreover, since he was my first pitcher, I couldn’t train with Mr. Rossby.
There were a few pitchers who threw similar velocity, so I was able to ask them to match the velocity, but as the velocity got faster, even a slight change in pitching form completely changed the perceived velocity, so it didn’t have much effect.
But that didn’t mean I could go into the game in this mood, so I raised my voice with confidence.
“… Hmm. Then I will go and talk to you privately.”
And the coach answered my confident question as if he was embarrassed…,
“Baby, confidence is good.”
“Haha, hey, Ji. Do you think a pitcher who is easy for you will be difficult for us? You’re speaking well after going 0-hit in 4 at-bats yesterday. Haha.”
“Mad! There’s no need for that! If Ji feels like it’s easy, it won’t be a bad day.”
… The atmosphere of the players was definitely better than before, when they were sitting with expressions on their faces.
*
[Hey, I’m really looking forward to today’s game, right? The match between Paul Skins and Ji Maeng-ho, you don’t always see this kind of match, right?]
[You’re right. In fact, both players are considered to be the most talented…]
The second game of the season between the New York Yankees and Pittsburgh Pirates. Ahead of the match between Paul Skins and Ji Maeng-ho, a local major league commentator said that he was the best talent.
In fact, there were some major league fans who would be surprised if the word ‘top talent’ was added in front of Paul Skins’ name. Among the Skins’ same-age players was Grilling, who had already won the Cy Young Award two years in a row and had become the best pitcher in the league.
Therefore, if someone compared the two players, the Skins and Grilling, it was not surprising that they would be lynched by a group of people who know how to watch baseball.
However, the local commentator who said that Skins was the best talent was not particularly wrong. It was a bit unfair to label Grilling, who was already a mature player, a prospect, and there were other important factors in evaluating a pitcher’s talent other than performance.
The important element is restraint.
Grilling also had a top speed of 100 mph and boasted an average speed in the mid-90s, but Skins was a player who threw at 100 mph at an average speed, and a pitcher who threw a fast ball was always the target of expectations. As evidenced by the highest ever contract payment of $9.2 million.
In addition, Skins is not only a player with a fast ball, but also has the highest strikeouts per 9 innings since his debut and has the highest WAR among pitchers of his age group, excluding Grilling, so he could become the best pitcher in the league if given the opportunity. He was a player with great expectations.
Therefore, it was not strange to label Skins as the best talent.
And among the players that the Skins will face today, there was a player that no one could argue with who was called ‘the best talent.’
The player’s name, of course, is Ji Maeng-ho.
Judge is considered the best hitter of the 2020s, recording the most home runs by a clean hitter. Since 2018, the Yankees’ OPS has not fallen below 0.8 in a single season, and there have been players in the Yankees’ batting lineup like Soto, a genius hitter who recorded scores of 0.282/0.419/0.519/0.938 over a 10-year period,
Ji Maeng-ho, who surpassed those players, was enough to make the term ‘best talent’ his own modifier.
And the word in front of Ji Maeng-ho’s modifier was the word ‘Yeokdae’.
‘The greatest talent of all time.’
It was a modifier given to Ji Maeng-ho after less than half a season of performance.
Babe Ruth changed the paradigm of the sport of baseball and became baseball itself.
Barry Bonds, who created the most destructive season in Major League history, showed what kind of performance the best hitter in the league, who was already a Hall of Famer even before taking medication, would perform when taking medication.
Power, contact, base running, defense, arm. Willie Mays, the most perfect five-tool player in the history of baseball who showed perfection in all aspects, was said to be the best hitter of all time because Ruth lacked defense and base running tools.
Ty Cobb is the first MVP winner to create the MVP system in the major leagues, and is considered the best hitter of all time, with a career batting average of .300, 6.6, 12 batting titles, and a .400 batting average three times.
Ted Williams, the last .400 hitter in the major leagues, had the highest career on-base percentage of 0.482 of all time and might have surpassed Babe Ruth’s record if he had not spent his prime years serving in the military.
In addition, Hank Aaron, ‘the man with 755 home runs’, Lou Gehrig, ‘the luckiest man on Earth’, Rossby, ‘the best second baseman of all time’, Stan Musial, ‘Stan the Man’, Ricky Henderson, ‘No. 1 in career stolen bases’, etc. 150 There have been many great hitters in the more than 100 years of Major League history, but no one could refute the adjective ‘the greatest talent of all time’ attached to Ji Maeng-ho.
Why?
This was because none of the players mentioned above had achieved the same results as Ji Meng-ho at the age of 23, in his first year of debut.
No, regardless of age, no player’s career high was better than Ji Maeng-ho’s current performance.
Ji Maeng-ho’s current performance is enough to make him an MVP contender even if he is out this season, and Ty Cobb’s batting average, Barry Bonds’ home run, Ted Williams’ on-base percentage, and Ricky Henderson’s stolen bases have to be combined to make it at a level where Ji Maeng-ho’s current performance would be good or not. .
Of course, not only has Ji Maeng-ho not played a single season yet, but to become the best player of all time, he needs to accumulate more accumulated records, so there are still no fans calling Ji Maeng-ho ‘the best player of all time’.
If Ji Maeng-ho achieved these grades, or even if he was slightly lower than these grades, even if he maintained roughly similar grades, no one would doubt that Ji Maeng-ho would become ‘the best player of all time.’
Talent meant that there was a possibility of becoming so, and the player with the greatest potential to become the best player of all time was Ji Maeng-ho.
Therefore, even when the phrase ‘the greatest talent of all time’ was attached to Ji Maeng-ho, no one doubted or refuted it.
And because Skins also knew this, he was looking at Ji Meng-ho on the mound, hiding his burning competitive spirit under the mask of a poker face.
‘The greatest talent of all time? … I can’t admit it.’
The average speed for a pitcher is 100 miles per hour. He was able to throw 100 mph at a dream velocity, and as a hitter, he had an OPS of over 1.0 in the college league. Skins was a player who had been deeply in love with baseball since he was young,
Since he was a pitcher with such high self-esteem that if anyone should be put in front of Babe Ruth, that someone should be him, he could not acknowledge Ji Maeng-ho.
If Ji Maeng-ho, who was standing at bat, heard Skins’ thoughts like that, he would have thought, ‘Anyway, why are the pitchers so stupid and so proud?’ But no matter how Ji Maeng-ho is, he can’t read people’s minds like the media says. Since I had no choice, I glared at Skins, thinking, ‘You look so fucking stupid.’
And those eyes succeeded in heating Skins’ hearts even more.
‘Yes, I will beat you and become the best. ‘At this place today.’
“Strike!”
[Skins’ first pitch! It sticks in the zone! The speed was set at 103.1 miles (165.9 km/h)!]
[Hey, as expected, it’s very hot from the first pitch, as if it’s a match between the most anticipated players, right? I know that the highest speed of a Skins player is 103.6 miles (166.7 km/h) recorded in 2026, but today’s Skins may surpass their own highest speed. Haha.]
The battle between the two players, who are considered to be the best talents of today, began to heat up from the start of the game.