In the second half of the inning, the opponent's pitcher Number 11 was a pitcher who had played in spring training before. The ball speed was about 132. He should be able to Four-Seam Fastball, Two-Seam Fastball and Slider.
Kinoshita Little League's bat, Yoshino, had a very low batting average against pitcher No. 11 in the last game. Because of the follow-up pitching strategy adopted by Myoizumi Little League, each pitcher may only pitch two innings before being dismissed. The amount of data is too small.
But training will give people confidence. It has been more than a month since spring training, and I can play well this time!
Yoshino was focused and hit the first pitch. As soon as the ball hit the ball, he felt a little bad, but he still dropped the bat and ran. The ball bounced near Pitcher's Mound, passed high through the shortstop's catch, and finally rolled towards the outfield.
"Good job!" Yoshino didn't feel relieved until he stepped on On Base's bag and the referee spread his hands.
The second player is center fielder Ōno. He and Yoshino are actually of the same type, that is, they have fast feet. Relatively speaking, Yoshino's batting rate is slightly higher than First Year of High School.
But he is very good at penalty kicks, hitting a ball in the direction of third base and rolling forward along the sideline.
"Don't move, don't move!" the catcher yelled from the side. The third baseman and pitcher who rushed up backed up. Looking at the ball, it suddenly stopped on the sideline. The referee on the side judged "inbounds!"
"Huh? -" Compared to Kinoshita Dugout's cheers, Myoizumi Little League all made doubtful sounds. This guy's order must be too coincidental. He has practiced it so many times.
Pitcher No. 11 had no choice but to catch the ball with his glove, pick it up and throw it to the catcher. He turned around and went to Pitcher's Mound. Now there were Kinoshita Little League people standing on the first and second bases.
'This team is really tough, it's hard to chew, and it's easy to break your teeth. '
Because he was nervous, pitcher No. 11 threw a ball to first base. The catcher's glove drooped down. When the pitcher looked this way again, he opened his hands and patted his armor to signal him to relax.
Then he shot two Sliders in a row, both bad balls.
The catcher was a little anxious and called a timeout.
"Go with peace of mind and use Two-Seam Fastball to catch a double kill later."
"I know."
But I knew that the catcher was too cautious, and the batter was struggling with the ball selection at this moment, which directly accumulated four bad balls. In such a short time, no one was out and the bases were loaded.
The next pitch was Kinoshita Little League's fourth pitch. The catcher asked for another timeout. In fact, he was buying time for the pitcher to recover.
Pitcher No. 11 is doing okay at the moment, as he often encounters this situation. When the bases are loaded, his concentration is better than before.
'This pitcher is very calm. 'Hayakawa understands this kind of pitcher. As a catcher, he can't help but observe the opponent's pitcher when playing games with various teams. This kind of pitcher has a soft personality, but if you see that he is soft, you feel that you can directly It would be a mistake to beat him. The consequence of being soft is that he often encounters various difficult problems, such as being constantly hit out, and there are often people on the base. Therefore, he is very experienced and has strong toughness. He is not the kind of pitcher who can be easily beaten.
Such a pitcher, what kind of ball will he throw at this time?
The first ball, a straight ball from an inside corner, landed on the edge of Strike Zone. "Good ball -" the referee picked up the ball. It was obvious that the unstable start was over.
Then the next ball, Outside Low Corner, Hayakawa moved the stick, but did not swing it out. When Hayakawa was about to hit a straight ball, the ball turned outward, "Bad ball!"
"Huh——" Fortunately, after being struck out by Slider last time, he was careful this time and didn't swing it directly, otherwise it would have been two good balls.
"Tch—" Myoizumi Little League, who was on the other side, felt unbalanced at the same time. It was obvious that he was lured out by this ball last time.
The catcher took another look at Hayakawa under the mask. This four-bat seemed to be very confident in his swing speed, so he dared to watch until the end and confirm the path of the ball before taking action.
Swing speed is a very important quality in hitting ability. In fact, there is a lot of research on hitting in professional baseball now, but unlike pitching, hitting is a problem of energy transmission chain, which is often difficult to explain clearly.
But one thing is certain. When professional baseball is naming names, one point that will be examined when it comes to hitting is the swing speed. Professional pitchers all have very fast pitching speeds, and all of them have special skills. There is always one that makes people unable to hit, but fortunately they will all end up at Home Plate Near, hit the good ball and let the bad ball pass. As long as the batter can react and keep up with the swing speed, the time between starting and the actual strike can be shortened to the shortest and the observation time extended to the longest. In this way, when the ball reaches Home Plate before hitting, no matter how many changes there are, it will not affect the strike.
So for the third ball, let's take a Two-Seam Fastball straight ball that moves in front of Home Plate. It's very difficult to hit a ball that moves at the end, and it can be combined with a high-speed ball to be called a "strong tail ball."
Pitcher No. 11 thought about the scene when Hayakawa hit a fly ball last time, and felt a little more at ease.
The next moment he threw the ball, it went straight to the outside corner.
Hayakawa stared at the ball closely. In less than a second in actual time, he had gone through all the balls that the pitcher had thrown to him before. Finally, he judged that it was Two-Seam Fastball. When he came to the conclusion, he had already swung the bat halfway and hit the ball in the direction of the change of the baseball.
"Bump--" The two collided, and the baseball quickly flew out of the home plate and headed towards the outfield.
Yoshino at third base was two steps away from the base bag and kept his feet flexible. Once he was caught, he had to step on the base bag and rush forward. But the reality was that the center fielder fell to the ground and missed the ball. At the base commander's command, Yoshino rushed straight to home plate. Due to muscle habits, he still slipped the base, but he quickly stood up again.
In the commotion, Yoshino saw that the opponent had picked up the ball and passed it to home plate, so he raised his hands and signaled Ōno at third base not to rush over.
"It's still too shallow," Hayakawa, who was sorting out at first base, regretted.
Next, it's up to Kōshū. Now it's a good situation with the bases loaded and no one out.
After Kōshū looked at the situation on the field, he stood at Batter's Box and felt the scrutiny from the catcher behind him. He thought in his mind that the characteristics of this pitcher were straight balls plus Slider, so why are there so many people who know Slider now? Otherwise, he should learn Slider next time.
'Last time, this guy was a four-bat guy and he hit the straight ball really well. ' After thinking about it, Myoizumi Little League's catcher decided to use a straight ball through Changeup to solve Kōshū.
So the first pitch was a straight ball from Outside Low Corner, which was thrown a little lower. Pitcher No. 11 nodded. Although it was meaningless, he still looked back at the runner on the base bag, and then quickly threw the ball.
"Bad ball!"
If you throw the ball too fast, the pitching rhythm will easily break, and if you are not careful, it will be judged as a foul of the pitcher's "throwing too fast". The catcher gets a ball from the referee, stands up and passes it back to the pitcher, pressing down with his hand to signal the pitcher to slow down.
The second ball, towards the outside corner, Slider, will slide out of Strike Zone.
Kōshū knew it was Slider when the ball reached the middle, but he couldn't tell whether the ball would slide into the bad zone. If he forced the ball out, it would be a double play, so he stopped mid-swing.
"Good shot!"
'Haha——As expected, it's not so much that he can't play Changeup, but rather that he is always hesitant to take action against the marginal Changeup. '
The situation is now good and bad. Kōshū looked back at Dugout's coach. Coach Ninomiya had no feedback. He just touched the brim of his hat and signaled him to handle it himself.
Kōshū couldn't help but recall the sense of accomplishment that he felt when he just started playing baseball and could keep up with the ball. He also recalled how refreshing it was when he bullied Shibasaki, who only had a ball speed of more than 120. Now it's just like the past. The blow is not just a blow, but also playing tricks. Once you lose your composure and your weakness is discovered, you can easily get in the game and still get out, but you will be outed for the second time.
Today I am planning to buy another desk. I sit cross-legged on the bed and type every day. After sitting there all day on Sunday, I feel like the blood in my lower body is no longer flowing.