The First Day of Practice

"So you became their coach? Training starts tomorrow? ⊙_⊙!"

"But what about me? You can't just abandon me like this, can you?"

"Say something!"

Sendou, who had just confirmed the Baseball Club's plan, was bombarded with questions from his childhood friend that evening.

However, Sendou was not in the mood to talk at the moment.

"Tokyo, is it sunny right now? Then the starry sky outside should be beautiful! After all, it's almost summer." But Sendou's smile didn't match the seriousness of his words.

"Yeah, it's sunny! (Laugh)"

And then? Then there was no then.

"Stare..."

"Looks like it's settled, what a troublesome guy." A few minutes later, seeing no message, Sendou left this sentence and threw his phone aside.

"I'm a little sleepy, but I don't want to sleep at all! My hard-earned vacation is over just like that! And my Going-Home Club life... kesou!"

In the end, Sendou, tossing and turning, still fell into a dream. Completely forgetting something.

"Stare...!"

"Crap, it's already this late! I have to take a shower and go to sleep!" Saying that, Wakaba hurriedly stood up and started busying around.

Well, the natural airhead Wakaba also completely forgot something and didn't notice anything unusual.

"Speaking of which, our school really has few clubs. There's hardly anyone after school, and the Baseball Club doesn't have any seniors. By the way, the Baseball Club was founded by you, right? Eijun!"

"Yup~, that's right!" Sawamura said in his uniquely exaggerated, serious tone, showing how happy he was that Sendou joined the Baseball Club.

"And, Teacher Sano must be exhausted by you, right?" Sendou said, looking at the dozens of balls in the box.

"Eh?"

"Haha, that's right, Little Sano is often pestered by Little Eijun! Like, take us to play a practice match, and if we win, treat us to Barbecue. In the end, we lost the match but still got treated to Barbecue. And things like the Baseball Club needing funds. A lot of the Baseball Club's stuff was bought with Little Sano's money!" Ono said with a smile, and then the others laughed along, only Sawamura was a little embarrassed by what was said.

"Sounds pretty good!"

"Eh?" Everyone looked at Sendou in confusion.

"This Baseball Club needs someone shameless like you. Hahaha!"

"Tei, mei, Sendou!" Everyone immediately held Sawamura back.

"Alright, that's enough joking around. Fielders, all of you go to your respective defensive positions. Shin, put on the protective gear."

"Okay!" Takeda Shin replied.

The others started to move.

"What about me?" Sawamura said, pointing at himself.

"Oh, if you have time, go run! Be careful not to get hit by the ball!"

"Huh?"

"Hmm?"

"No, no, no, it's nothing, I'll go run right away." Saying that, Sawamura immediately started running around the field as if fleeing.

The good thing about schools in the countryside is that there's no shortage of space, Sendou muttered to himself.

"I will keep hitting, be prepared!" Then he shouted to the whole field.

"Ooooh!!!" The whole field responded.

"First, the Third Baseman!"

"Ping!" Just like Coach Nakanishi back then, he hit a ground ball with a not-so-fast ball.

The Third Baseman easily caught it and passed it to the First Baseman.

However, the throw went wide...

"One more ball, Third Baseman!!!"

"Ping!"

However, he didn't catch it...

"..."

The scene was quite awkward for a moment.

Sendou supported his forehead with his right hand.

"Forget it, the defensive positions are canceled, all of you stand in a row here for me!" Sendou said speechlessly for a while, pointing to the normal defensive position of the Third Baseman.

"Wakaba, put on your glove and go to First Base to catch the ball."

"Oh, okay." Wakaba agreed and ran to the First Base position.

"What have you guys been doing these past few years, you bunch of idiots? This is what I practiced on my first day in Little League, and the ball speed is the same. You guys are even worse than I was at 9 years old. No, worse than those of my peers who were even worse than me when I was 9. Just now, my bat only touched the ball, there was no ball speed at all, and you still missed it, and you haven't even played catch well? What do you usually do?" Sendou groaned weakly.

"Sorry, Sen-chan!"

"No, maybe you just made mistakes. But these low-level mistakes are the reason why every out you should have gotten turns into a hit. What I said yesterday was that the first thing we need to do is get all the outs we should have gotten, without exception. Got it?!!!"

Sendou, who had been speaking clearly at the beginning, suddenly shouted loudly at the last sentence.

"Yes!!!"

"Then, there is only one way to eliminate these mistakes: constant practice. You must catch them all, and then I will speed up until you can do these things in the game. Let's start, one more ball!"

"Ping!"

After that, this group of people proved just how bad they really were.

Although Sendou also realized something, he didn't plan to stop.

He, as a hitting coach, is not like Coach Kataoka in the original work, who hits the ball with all his strength. He really just hits the ball like a bunt, but with a little more force to flick the bat and hit the ball.

But it's normal for this group to miss catches and throw wildly.

However, as time went on, and with Sendou speaking up midway.

"First, ensure success. It doesn't matter if the throws are a little slower, just let the body remember the feeling of exerting force."

After hearing this, the throws to First Baseman after catching the ball finally had fewer wild throws.

Half an hour later, seeing that the catching had also begun to stabilize, Sendou slightly increased the speed, but not by much. He wouldn't continuously accelerate and increase the speed drastically with each ball like Coach Nakanishi had done when testing him.

Sawamura, who was quietly running laps on the field, looked at them resentfully as he ran...

However, he had already been forgotten.

He was the only real idiot on this team. Although what Sendou was having them do was simple and repetitive, they all understood that the reasons Sendou gave were correct.

There was no slacking off. Although many of them had joined the Baseball Club because of Sawamura's presence, it was also because of Sawamura's presence that they had come to understand the fun of Baseball.

Having never watched a game before, and not even knowing the rules, they were receiving proper guidance for the first time. Although it was monotonous and boring, they were all enjoying it.

I started writing today and felt like something was missing from the training part, something was off. Then I watched a few more episodes of the anime, specifically finding the Oya part of the Autumn Tournament, and the amateur team training scenes from Umemiya's Bad Boy Army to try and find some inspiration. By the way, what was the name of Umemiya's Bad Boy Army team? I don't think I can spell it, can someone tell me the pinyin? Also, asking for recommendation tickets. It seems like there's some kind of anime recommendation thing going on today, which I don't really understand, so I'm asking for your help.