Inside the ballpark, led by their respective team captains, the players of Waseda Jitsugyo and Nihon University lined up on both sides of ho plate and then took off their hats to salute their opponents.
If soone had just turned on the TV at this mont, judging by the players’ expressions, they wouldn’t be able to tell who the victor was—whether Waseda Jitsugyo or Nihon University, neither side’s players had a smile on their face.
For Waseda Jitsugyo, losing the ga also likely ant losing their entry to the Senbatsu High School Baseball Tournant, and naturally, the players’ spirits weren’t uplifted, even for Lin Guanglai, who hit several ho runs;
To be honest, if he could exchange each strikeout for his team winning the ga and gaining the entry to Senbatsu and Shengong, Lin Guanglai wouldn’t mind being struck out each at-bat by the opponent.
In his view, compared to the team’s achievents, personal stats were of little importance—after all, Koshien is not a professional ga, and there are no awards like Best Player or Best Pitcher.
For Nihon University, having won the ga, secured victory, and obtained the Shengong entry, the Senbatsu entry for the coming year was almost assured—but they still felt so discomfort about this match.
Especially for Yoshinaga Kentarou, who pitched a complete ga victory, this strange feeling was even more intense:
While his performance wasn’t bad, delivering 10 strikeouts throughout the ga, and securing several shutouts against Waseda Jitsugyo, allowing only five or six hits in the entire match, definitely making him a key contributor to the team’s victory;
But if you say his performance was impressive, it’s hard to call it great when a pitcher in a nine-inning ga gets hit for three ho runs by the sa batter.
Both sides’ players, holding similar yet different feelings, stepped out from their respective ranks to greet their opponents post-ga.
"You played really well!"
Almost every Nihon University’s player specifically sought out Lin Guanglai to greet him—as opponents, they were unquestionably impressed by Lin Guanglai’s superb performance during the ga and offered sincere praise.
Nihon University’s coach Ogura Quanyou also expressed his views towards Izumi Minoru, although his tone carried a hint of sourness:
"Izumi, you sure are lucky to have found such a great talent."
"If we had this kid at our school—I’d dare to say we’d win the national tournants every year this year, next year, and even the year after!"
In response, Coach Izumi Minoru simply smiled without speaking, though his lips couldn’t help but curl up—clearly, this praise from an old rival was effective for him.
However, when he turned around to face his own players, Izumi Minoru’s entire face imdiately fell.
The Waseda Jitsugyo players, seeing their coach’s stern expression, didn’t dare speak loudly, and solemnly stood in place.
After the awards ceremony for the autumn tournant concluded, with trophies and certificates in hand, the Waseda Jitsugyo players had just stepped into the players’ rest area when they felt the full force of their coach’s storm-like reprimands.
Every player who played today, including Lin Guanglai, was thoroughly scolded by Coach Izumi Minoru from top to bottom, inside and out, especially the bottom batting lineup whose performance fluctuated throughout today’s ga and the entire autumn tournant.
In fact, Coach Minoru’s stern expression was intentionally displayed; for this ga’s result, he’d prepared himself ntally long ago, knowing that with Waseda Jitsugyo’s current strength, winning against Nihon University by sheer force was tough.
According to the original plan, Lin Guanglai was supposed to pitch today—but who could foresee yesterday’s ga against National Academy Kugayama went into eleven innings of extra play, straining Waseda Jitsugyo’s already limited pitching power even further.
For field players, even with consecutive gas every day for a week, it’s mostly physical and ntal fatigue; however, pitchers absolutely can’t throw long innings consecutively for two days, otherwise it’s killing the player’s pitching career.
Since the third-year students retired, though Waseda Jitsugyo still has several nominal pitchers, few can participate in high-level matches, showing a severe lack of imdiate fighting power; plus, the issue of offensive coherence requires more ti for adjustnt.
"It seems like finding a capable substitute for Guanglai must be prioritized..." Coach Izumi Minoru thought as he gazed at the players before him.
After the autumn Tokyo tournant final ended, online discussions surged again, with many baseball fans chiming in on a thread discussing Lin Guanglai’s performance in the final.
[Post 1: Hahaha, witnessed the scene, Lin’s skill is too strong! Scoring three hors in one ga felt like playing Big Head Baseball on the lowest difficulty—ps: managed to catch one of his three hors (image) (image)]
[Post 2: Envious of the poster above, but I have to say, a player who can pitch and continuously hit ho runs like this can’t even be created in Big Head Baseball, let alone with such a handso face.]
...
[Post 22: My goodness, haven’t seen such an outrageous high school player in years—until the comntator ntioned it, I didn’t realize Lin Guanglai, as a batter, hadn’t struck out once in this autumn tournant, only being thrown out at most.]
[Post 23: What? Not a single strikeout? Ridiculous!
[Post 24: Ridiculous 1]
[Post 25: Ridiculous 2]
[Post 77: Ridiculous 10086]
...
[Post 111: Why is Lin only a freshman this year!!! Can’t wait to see him turn professional, as a Lyon fan, I can’t wait to see him join us, forming the strongest pitching duo with Kikuchi!]
[Post 112: Why can’t he co to the Giant? The best players should pair with Japan’s best team, and we have Abe, a super catcher, forming the strongest pitcher-catcher duo is perfect, isn’t it?]
[Post 113: How about joining Rakuten, team up with Masa (nickna for Tanaka Masahiro), I don’t know which lineup in Japan could possibly break through.]
[Post 114: Join SoftBank! Our president is an alumni of Waseda Jitsugyo, and SoftBank is just missing a young, promising face as a pitcher, managent please take a look quickly!]
...
Teenagers’ emotions co quickly and go quickly—on the return bus, Waseda Jitsugyo players had already moved past the disappointnt of losing the match, with so even discussing plans for the upcoming vacation.
Due to being knocked out in the autumn tournant, all official matches for Waseda Jitsugyo Baseball Club this year ca to a close—November’s Shengong tournant will be the last major event of the year, after which high school baseball will enter its winter break until the fire of the spring Koshien lights up again in March next year.
For Lin Guanglai, these past six months have seen him, as a main player, win the sumr regional tournant, gain entry to Sumr甲, create records in Sumr甲, and achieve decent success as runners-up in the autumn tournant.
Sitting in the last row of the bus, Lin Guanglai, with eyes closed, had already started to ponder next year’s journey—whether eligible for entry to the spring tournant is unknown, yet he’s prepared to face the challenges of next year’s spring tournant and Sumr甲.
Sitting at the front, Coach Izumi Minoru stood up, looking at the slightly restless players, announcing a series of arrangents for the team’s future:
"Firstly, everyone has worked hard during this period of training and matches! We’ll be taking a week off next week, granting everyone a good rest."
"Oh yeah!" The players erupted with cheers upon hearing this, "Thank you, Coach," "Long live Coach," and similar expressions continuously reverberated.
"However," Minoru shifted his tone: "After next week’s rest, I’ve already arranged for team training."
"Everyone on the main team—join in Kanagawa Prefecture for training."
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