Chapter 2: Unexpectedly Difficult

In the first half of the first inning, Seidou High School attacked.

The starting pitcher of Maimon High School surprised Seidou's players.

The starting pitcher is not their No. 1 Ace, but the No. 10 Minamidaira Mamoru.

What the hell is this?

Chris did not participate in the investigation, and the information on Minamidaira Mamoru was not available on Seidou's side.

"In this way, we can only play and observe!"

Kuramochi shook his shoulders and stepped into the strike zone.

In the audience, Seidou alumni are very worried.

"Today is our first battle, I hope it won't be too difficult."

"No, we have Yuuki and Sawamura."

"Maybe, the other party looks very powerful!"

***

No matter what the Popcorn enjoyers were talking about, Kuramochi's eyes were firmly locked on the opponent's pitcher.

The starter is not the southpaw Ace, but the No. 10 Minamidaira Mamoru!

They have no information on this guy.

His skills are completely unknown.

Under such circumstances, when the batter stands on the strike zone, the situation is very passive.

And from the ball that Minamidaira and practiced throwing before, Kuramochi was also very surprised.

This Minamidaira is a very rare submarine pitcher.

There are three main types of pitching form: Overhand throw, Side throw, and Submarine.

Most pitchers are of Overhand throw type.

Side throw or Sidearm throw are like Kawakami, when he throws the ball, his arms go around the side of the body, not over the top of his head. This is the so-called side throw, and pitching in such a position naturally has his unique advantages.

In addition to these two, there is also another type. At the moment of stepping, the arm goes around the body and is lower than the front knee.

This is called the Submarine throw. And people call this pitcher a submarine pitcher.

This kind of pitching has a lot of limitations, which is losing part of the speed and power of the ball. Also because of its pitching trajectory, it enters the strike zone from the bottom up, which is different from the other two throws, which will make the batter very uncomfortable.

So this pitching method also has its unique advantages.

In the first game, they encountered such a strange form!

Kuramochi raised the bat in his hand high.

Playing against a pitcher like Minamidaira was something he had never thought of before.

'So how should I deal with him~'

The responsibility of the first batter must be to stand on the base, but for a pitcher whom they have never met before, even if he suddenly blindly hits the pitch, it will be helpful.

'I might as well take a good look at his pitching.'

Right now, Kuramochi had already made up his mind to watch the ball first. Even if he couldn't make the first hit, he could share the information he observed with Ryo-san later.

What level is the opponent? This is also unclear, and it is not helpful to attack rashly when it is not clear.

'I have to plan for the long term~'

The cheerleaders of the Second String, commanded by Maezono in the stands, were not silent.

"Hit it out!"

"You can do it!"

"Use your speed to disrupt the opponent!"

They are standing and talking big. Kuramochi doesn't know what kind of ball the opponent will throw, so how do you ask Kuramochi to swing?

Whoosh!

In any case, Minamidaira's first ball was thrown.

Unlike the average submarine pitcher, he swung his arms outward as he pitched.

Not quite a submarine pitcher, more like a submarine side thrower.

SNAP!

Nevertheless, the ball moved and landed in the catcher's open Mitt with a crisp sound.

After just one Pitch, Kuramochi's face changed.

'So sloww!'

And when the opponent pitched the ball over, the course was very low, even lower than expected.

The pitcher's throwing form also looked very awkward, even more than Kawakami's.

The speed of the ball is very slow, so it is not easy for Kuramochi to deal with such a ball, because his swing speed is much faster than the ball speed, so he needs to sync the timing.

If not, it will be a foul ball.

SNAP!

He didn't observe much with the first ball and with the second ball he still didn't swing.

"STRIKE!"

Kuramochi lost two Strikes and was chased by the pitcher.

Right now, he had noticed the pitcher's quality of the ball, because the pitching form was particularly low, the ball floated from the bottom to the top, and then sank after it floated up!

'This is the variation of the Submarine form!'

If you want to hit this kind of ball, you must aim at the point after the rise and before it sinks again.

However, it was really awkward, and he was forced to fall behind by two strikes.

Kuramochi looked at his opponent with a headache.

The dugout of ​​Maimon High School.

Chiba Junichi excitedly held the cheering megaphone in his hand for cheering.

If it is useful, he will use it.

Minamidaira was a talented pitcher at Maimon at the beginning, but he did not expect to hurt his joints in a practice game.

Since then, have been unable to swing his arms upwards. It's not impossible, it's just he can't put much power in the ball at all.

As a pitcher, he was the equivalent of being broken.

For Minamidaira Mamoru, who loves baseball, this is like he has been struck by thunder.

Chiba Junichi couldn't bear to see him so sad. So he told him that there was another way.

It took him two full years to change his pitching form to the Submarine form.

This is impossibly hard for an ordinary player to do.

However, Mamoru he did it!

Not to mention the real game, even in practice games, he never let Minamidaira Pitch.

Now, it's time to reap the fruit of patience and witness the miracle!

The batter from Seidou High School was stunned in the face of an opponent who had no information at all.

'Doesn't it make you happy that you have forced a Famous School to look like this?'

"Minamidaira, you can do it!"

Whoosh!

The white ball whizzed out, and instantly crossed the pitcher's hand and arrived at the catcher's Mitt.

In the face of this ball, he had already lost two Strikes, and Kuramochi, who was being chased, could only swing his bat.

At the moment when the bat was about to touch the ball, the white ball suddenly sank.

The bat swept past the small white ball.

SNAP!

"STRIKE! BATTER OUT!"

The first Batter of Seidou High School was struck out.

"Yeahh!!!!"

On the pitcher's mound, there was a roar from Minamidaira.

All the emotions accumulated in his mind exploded at this moment!

After two years, he finally stood up on the mound again.

"I'm sorry! Nothing of value has been found."

Kuramochi, who was struck out, was a little frustrated, but he was still very calm and exchanged information with Ryosuke Kominato.

"It's enough to see the breaking ball."

Kominato Ryosuke didn't care, it was his and Isashiki's responsibility to deal with such a strange pitcher as Minamidaira.

One of them has a superb swinging skill. The other who is particularly good at hitting tricky Pitches…

'Bring it on!'

…

T/N: That's it for Today.

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