Baseball: A Two-Way Player

Chapter 699 33: Linvicible 2

As Ramirez stepped into the batter's box once again, Lin Guanglai's second pitch came whistling through: this time, he threw a fastball straight towards the outer corner of the strike zone.

The previous pitch left Ramirez struggling somewhat; from his perspective, this pitch was certainly a good ball, but the question was, is it a fastball, or could it be a changeup?

From the pitcher's mound to home plate, 18.44 meters, accounting for the time it takes for nerve reactions, the batter has less than half a second to make a judgment. Within this less than half a second, Ramirez made up his mind, decisively choosing to swing using the mechanism for hitting a fastball.

The baseball grew closer and closer to home plate, its trajectory still straight, proving Ramirez's assumption right—this was indeed a fastball!

Just as he was cheering inwardly, determined to pull the ball hard out of Yankee Stadium's right field, the next second, the ball's trajectory surprisingly appeared to slightly rise, ultimately avoiding Ramirez's bat by about half a ball's width, flying into home plate through position nine of the strike zone's grid.

He swung and missed! Another good ball!

Ramirez felt greatly shocked, immediately looking up at the central field screen—"A 101 mph fastball with such a strong rising effect, the spin rate must be above 2500 turns... Damn, fooled again!" Ramirez gritted his teeth, looking over at Lin Guanglai once more; he then stepped out of the batter's box, taking deep breaths while his brain worked at high speed, thinking about the next tactic.

Actually, Ramirez didn't need to think much because the Indians' data collection had already answered for him:

In the absolutely advantageous position of no balls and two strikes, Lin Guanglai chooses to rely on his two concurrent forkball pitches over 65% of the time; the former generates a swing and miss rate of 35%, while the latter reaches a daunting 41%—the question now is, as batter Ramirez, how to hit the ball, or simply put, how to just foul it off?

The atmosphere in the Indians' box felt a bit oppressive at this moment:

Ramirez's state in recent times was very well known to his teammates; however, this high-caliber batter had no chance to fight back against Lin Guanglai—anyone with eyes could see that Ramirez was already in a desperate situation with no means of countering.

Beside them, Corey Kluber looked equally serious. Although he had absolute confidence in his abilities, the Yankees lineup, known for leading Major League Baseball in home runs, wasn't easy to handle; Lin Guanglai was his biggest competitor for his second career Cy Young Award, and if possible, Kluber understandably hoped his lineup could help him defeat the opponent.

Stepping into the batter's box again, having adjusted his batting stance, Ramirez still hadn't thought of a counter-strategy. Sweat inevitably dripped down his forehead, and he decided to bet on a gamble.

The white ball slipped out of Lin Guanglai's fingertips, drawing an arc in the air, and rushed towards the batter's box once more. Faced with this aggressively incoming ball, Ramirez dared not take it lightly, his eyes never leaving the ball, swinging the bat in the predetermined hitting style.

Good news, he did hit the ball!

Bad news, he only scraped the very top layer of the baseball's leather, unable to affect the trajectory at all.

Ramirez's mood at this moment was much like the constantly sinking baseball, getting lower and lower until it vanished into Gary Sanchez's glove.

The umpire forcefully pulled the bow, foul tip caught, batter struck out!!!

"Three up, three down!", "Beautiful!", "Lin Huang invincible!" Yankee Stadium thundered with cheers, and many Yankees fans stood up from their seats to applaud their star player:

Pre-game, unanimous support for the Indians from various media made Yankee fans very dissatisfied; their star player's current performance could be said to fiercely curb the opponent's momentum, naturally satisfying the Yankees fans.

Meanwhile, over at the die-hard stands in right field, a huge banner with the word "Linvicible" was once again raised by Yankees fans.

This was the die-hard fans' way of expressing their love for Lin Guanglai, using Lin's surname and the Latin word 'invincible' to create this new term; every time Lin Guanglai pitched a perfect inning or hit a home run, the banner printed with this word would be displayed by them—this scene has become a new landscape in the Bronx, often appearing during Yankees home games this season.

The only player on this team who enjoys such treatment besides Lin Guanglai is the big slugger Aaron Judge, who has hit 47 home runs this season—because his last name "Judge" means "judge" in English, every time Judge hits a home run at home, there will be a special group of fans in court outfits in right field holding gavels, shouting "All Rise", mimicking the scene when a judge enters court.

In the TV broadcast room, YES TV, the Yankees' mouthpiece media, was broadcasting the match.

"A slider with perfect inner corner control, a 101 mph fastball with a spin rate of 2763, and also his signature pitch, a demonic forkball with cutter speed and forkball's large downward effect, such displacement changes are really disgusting!" exclaimed Michael Kay, the program's host, Yankees die-hard fan and veteran commentator, looking at the screen in front of him.

Guest, the steadfast mainstay right fielder of the Yankees in the 90s, Paul O'Neill also couldn't resist cheering for Lin Guanglai: "Honestly, Lin's pitching is truly beautiful, especially the combination of his quality fastball and two seemingly unsolvable breaking balls; even the strongest batters can't handle this set of moves."

Michael Kay, smiling, half-jokingly asked Paul O'Neill a high-level question: "Paul, if you were in Ramirez's position, do you think you could do better than him?"

"Ramirez did pretty well; if it were me, there wouldn't be much difference—it's like I always emphasize unless you can know in advance or just happen to bet right on what he's going to throw, otherwise, in less than 0.5 seconds, you simply can't react to anything."

O'Neill laughed and shook his head, expressing his helplessness, then followed with a bit of wit: "But you never know; I've heard Asian players respect their seniors very much, maybe Lin, seeing me as a Yankees old-timer, might go easy a bit... hahahaha."

Michael Kay laughed too, then turned his attention to another guest: "David, as a former Cy Young winner, what do you think of Lin's pitching? What's the likelihood of him winning the Cy Young title this season?"

The person Michael Kay was asking was David Cone, the 1994 Cy Young Award winner, who won four World Series championships with the Yankees during his player career, making great contributions as a starting pitcher.

"I've watched many Yankees games this season, and among Lin's commonly used pitches, at least the fastball, forkball, and the breaking ball he named 'Splinker' have already reached top-three, if not number-one, level in the Major League..." David Cone analyzed discerningly based on his understanding.

"I heard Lin plans to develop his previously unfavorable curveball further in this offseason; if he really masters an elite curveball, I can't imagine how much pain MLB batters will feel next season..."

"Perhaps his future really is like the die-hard fans say—"

"Major League batters, see me as an ant sees the blue sky."

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