Episode 2. The Rookie Draft (1)
“Yeehaw!”
Waking from sleep and assessing the situation, Jihun let out a roar before he knew it.
“Damn it. Let me sleep. Don’t you know I’m starting today.”
It was certain. That musty, grimy smell.
It was the smell of the high school baseball club dormitory, preserved in his memories.
The chubby bastard who had woken him with tremendous snoring, then had the gall to yell and turn over. Gi Dongchan.
If Ryu Hyeonjung was the first graduating class of the Daejeon Smiles Organization’s Mental Military Academy, this guy was the second class.
After going through rigorous mental training with the Smiles organization no less than Ryu Hyeonjung, he had advanced to America and won the Cy Young Award twice.
A proud friend who struck out Japanese batters like crazy whenever he met them in international competitions, earning him the nickname “Gaksital Pitcher.”
He didn’t know how it happened, but the moment he flipped the third card at the tarot cafe, he had returned to his third year of high school, twenty-seven years ago.
He didn’t want to know the reason. What was clear was that a second chance at life had come.
Without overcomplicating things, he decided to simply enjoy this moment.
It was the very thing he had longed and wished for. This time, he would definitely date, get married, and live a playing career without regrets.
Now wasn’t the time for that. From what Dongchan had said, it seemed there was a game today. He needed to check his physical condition and prepare. He hurried outside and swung a bat.
This was it. This feeling. It was still alive. His strength and power were definitely lacking, but with this bat speed and sensation...
He didn’t know which team it was, but today was going to be a day of wailing for them.
Good. They were all dead today.
Early August 2024. The President’s Cup National High School Baseball Championship. The day of the finals between Seoul’s powerhouse Shinseong High and Daejeon Dongil High.
On his first day after regressing, Jihun swung his bat like a madman. Though it was his first real game in ten years, the batting sense of a five-time consecutive Home Run King before retirement was more than enough to crush high school pitchers.
The ball looked huge. What was this? Was Mokdong Baseball Stadium always this small? It felt like he could send it over with just a casual swing.
A two-run homer to left-center, a solo shot pushed to right-center, four hits in five at-bats, five RBIs—he immersed himself recklessly in the game and swung away excitedly.
Behind Gi Dongchan’s stellar pitching—giving up five hits and one run over nine innings—and Jihun’s fierce hitting, they achieved a complete 8-1 victory.
In the end, Dongil High seized the President’s Cup championship, and Jihun even snagged the tournament MVP.
After a storm-like day passed, he returned home and met his father, mother, and older sister.
Tears burst forth. To think he would see his parents in their youth again.
Overjoyed, he hugged his mother, his father, and then his sister in turn.
“Well, well. Jihun must be in a good mood from winning the championship.”
“Indeed. Our son, you worked hard.”
“What’s wrong with him. Gross.”
Whack!
A powerful smash landed on his back. His sister’s temper was still the same. Even so, it was good.
After receiving his family’s congratulations and finishing dinner, he returned to his room, which remained a space of longing within his memories.
It was so comfortable and cozy, yet also anxiety-inducing.
Worried he might return to the future after a deep sleep, he could not easily fall asleep.
After tossing and turning for a while, he eventually drifted off.
‘Ahh!’
Opening his eyes with a start in the morning, it was still the same room. Relief washed over him, and his heart eased.
He turned on his smartphone and slowly began searching the news. Wow! This incredibly slow speed, like a slug. Only 5G.
No, how had he used something like this in this era?
It was 2024 now. It couldn’t be helped. Yes, yes. He had to adapt to this too.
As Jihun searched the news, an article about the Smiles organization appointing a new manager caught his eye.
[Smiles appoint Hyeon Myeonghan, battery coach, as new manager following the resignation of Manager Go Jidong due to poor performance.]
[Perennial cellar-dwellers Smiles: What is the background behind appointing Hyeon Myeonghan as manager?]
Next, news about the pro baseball rookie draft appeared.
[Who will receive the glory of a first-round draft pick? Pitcher Gi Dongchan, or catcher Gang Jihun?]
Before his regression. Jihun had received an offer to join the St. Louis organization and had headed straight to America after graduating high school.
After living in the minor leagues in Single-A and Double-A, he was called up to the Majors after three years.
However, the starting catcher for St. Louis at the time was Yadier Molina.
Though he had talked about retiring soon, the organization convinced him to stay, and he continued to play fiercely as the starting catcher. Jihun could barely seize an opportunity.
He only got occasional playing chances as the second backup catcher and backup first baseman.
For an Asian player who wasn’t fluent in English and had shallow experience to take the starting catcher position was an incredibly difficult task.
With his hitting sense ruined by lack of playing time, he swung for the fences unconditionally out of overeagerness to prove something.
He only managed about seven to nine home runs per year, and his batting average stayed in the low .200s, a complete mess.
He learned much from Molina but was insufficient to earn the organization’s trust. Eventually, he was traded to San Francisco.
Buster Posey was holding down the fort there. He announced his retirement, then quietly returned, perhaps because he needed money, and blocked Jihun’s path.
The team had recommended changing his defensive position to the outfield, but Jihun refused outright.
Because for Jihun, the position of catcher held a meaning that could not be changed carelessly.
Jihun was truly lonely. His adaptability was excellent, so it wasn’t difficult to get along with teammates.
But a catcher only feels completely whole when there is a pitcher who trusts him.
That was what Jihun’s baseball was.
Eventually, when his contract expired at age twenty-five, he turned down offers from other organizations and decided to return to the KBO.
He wanted to play as a starting catcher, and he needed to resolve his military service issue.
With his WBC participation experience, he barely enlisted in Sangmu, completed his military service, and participated in the rookie draft.
He joined the Seoul Royals, who held the first overall draft pick, played until age thirty-five, and then retired.
Afterward, he went to America, majored in psychology for seven years, returned to Korea, and ran a sports psychology counseling center.
During his Sangmu days, correcting his batting form, he launched forty or more home runs every year with the Seoul Royals, rightfully winning five Golden Gloves and three MVPs.
He led the team to four championships, opening the golden era of the Seoul Royals.
For three years before retirement, he hit fifty or more home runs consecutively, and won five consecutive Home Run King titles.
After majoring in psychology in America and returning, he received offers from many organizations to be an exclusive mental coach, but refused them all and ran a separate psychology counseling center.
Because there were likely issues that players couldn’t confide to organization-affiliated mental coaches.
By all rights, Gi Dongchan receiving the first overall pick was the natural order. But what made Jihun uneasy was the fact that the Smiles organization’s new manager was Hyeon Myeonghan.
Hyeon Myeonghan had been Jihun’s manager during his Seoul Royals days and was the person who had raised him as a catcher.
Hyeon Myeonghan was a player called the greatest catcher in KBO history.
From Hyeon Myeonghan, Jihun received hard training on the catcher’s role and defense, and was given full authority over pitch calling.
Hyeon Myeonghan had truly educated Jihun mercilessly.
Meeting Hyeon Myeonghan after joining the Seoul Royals was the luckiest moment of Jihun’s life.
Transforming from an offense-only catcher with strong hitting into a true catcher equipped with defense was entirely thanks to what he learned from Hyeon Myeonghan.
A manager who valued the catcher more than anyone else.
‘Damn.’
A groan escaped Jihun’s lips.
‘No way. There’s no way Smiles would nominate me in the first round. Not when they could have left-handed fireballer Gi Dongchan, whom they’d drag back from hell. Right, right. Unless their eyes are crooked, they wouldn’t fail to recognize a future Cy Young Award winner.’
As Jihun was calming his anxious heart, his phone rang early in the morning.
The Rocky OST. It had been Jihun’s entrance song during his Seoul Royals playing days.
The music that had raised him up whenever he was exhausted and struggling. Music that always made his heart swell and instilled the courage that he could do it.
He always met Dongchan at a Chinese restaurant.
They had no worries about choosing between jjajangmyeon or jjamppong. Each of them ordered both, extra-large. Plus one large sweet and sour pork.
They didn’t order fried dumplings. They came out as service.
Why? Why did the fried dumplings always come five to a plate?
Jihun had always wondered about this. There were two people; what were they supposed to do? It bothered him immensely.
Dongchan, as usual, reached for the last remaining dumpling but hesitated.
Jihun had a strange thought.
‘Strange. This isn’t like him. There’s something going on.’
Dongchan had always said these things to Jihun.
“A catcher is like a mother to the pitcher. So the last dumpling is for the pitcher. All mothers are like that.”
Damn. He only played the mother card at times like this.
“Haven’t you heard that the catcher is the commander of the field? Then what is the pitcher? A subordinate. So the commander should eat it.”
When Jihun countered with different logic, Dongchan responded slyly and leisurely.
“That’s an abuse of power.”
That was the kind of guy Dongchan was. He would absolutely never concede the last dumpling. When it came to food, he was so stingy it was beyond words.
After regressing, his senses had strangely improved. It might be intuition, but anyway, his instincts had developed tremendously.
The moment he got a definite ominous feeling that Dongchan had something he wanted to say, and that it was definitely not something advantageous to him.
“Jihun, I’m thinking of going straight to the Majors.”
‘No!’
Jihun screamed inwardly.
This was the worst.
By the original timeline, Jihun was supposed to go straight to the Majors, and Dongchan was supposed to go to Smiles. But fate was somehow twisting.
Jihun knew all too well how much he had regretted going straight to the Majors after watching Dongchan’s success in the past.
The reason Dongchan succeeded in the Majors was because he had trained his powerful mentality at the Smiles Mental Military Academy.
Even if he made a defensive error, “Huh.” Even if the closer lit the fire, “Huh.”
He had mastered expressionless, indifferent pitching in any situation, which allowed him to survive in the Majors.
This absolutely had to be stopped.
“Hey! Think again. It’s better to resolve the military issue here before going. You don’t know English and don’t know anyone there; how are you going to get by? And just saying. If you end up having to come back to Korea, you won’t be able to play for two years.”
“I did worry about that. But no matter how much I think about it, it seems better than being drafted by Smiles. Lately, Smiles has been really looking after me. I’m so anxious because I feel like they might nominate me first overall. I want to play in Korea for any team other than Smiles before going. But if I rot away in Smiles, I might lose my chance to challenge the Majors altogether. So I’m going to take a shot, come what may.”
Dongchan’s resolve seemed firm. Where had things gotten twisted?
Dongchan used to say it was much better to develop his skills in Korea than in the minors, that the food didn’t suit him and he couldn’t speak English, so what could he do alone there. He had even actively opposed Jihun’s direct path to the Majors.
He didn’t know what had changed his mind.
‘Could it be? This guy too.’
A strand of doubt accumulated in his heart. The thought of checking whether Dongchan was a regressor too crept up.
“Oh Hyeonju.”
He quietly called out the name of Gi Dongchan’s future wife and gauged his reaction.
“Oh Hyeonju? Who’s that? Are you seeing someone right now?”
Hmm. At this level, it didn’t seem like he was pretending not to know deliberately. If Gi Dongchan were a regressor, he wouldn’t hear the name Oh Hyeonju and ask if they were dating again.
For someone his size, how petty and stingy he was.
Completely deflated, he returned home. If this happened, the probability of being drafted by Smiles increased tremendously.
Just as Gi Dongchan said, Smiles was a team that couldn’t win. It was hard to shine on a team steeped in defeatism.
A team they cheered for but didn’t want to belong to.
That was Smiles.
A catcher’s efforts could only shine if the pitcher held up his end to some degree.
What good was it to know a batter had a weakness low and inside? The pitcher couldn’t throw it there.
“Today, catcher Gang Jihun’s lead was really good. I just threw looking at the catcher’s mitt.”
Always losing. In player interviews, his name was hardly ever mentioned like this.
When you played games you couldn’t win, you naturally developed symptoms of declining motivation and were likely to be stained by mediocrity.