If, during the very first inning of the ga, Watanabe Hisashi, the coach of the Seibu Team, could still sit relatively comfortably even though Takayuki Kishi had allowed a solo ho run to Lin Guanglai, he certainly couldn’t sit still now.
Watching Takayuki Kishi, who seed a bit dazed on the pitcher’s mound at Yahoo Do, Watanabe Hisashi glanced at the bench behind him and quickly issued orders to the pitching coach beside him:
"Get the relievers ward up!"
"If Kishi continues like this, we must change pitchers no matter what!"
Speaking of which, Watanabe Hisashi first glanced at the electronic scoreboard on the far right of Eagle’s Vision above the outfield. The score of SoftBank 4, Seibu 0 was indeed quite glaring; then he turned to look at Kikuchi Yuusei, sitting at the far edge of the players’ bench with a serious expression on his face, wearing a heavy jacket, and sighed.
What the Saitama Seibu Lions most rely on now, as the coach, Watanabe Hisashi knew all too well:
For the Seibu Team, which has always been known as the "pitcher kingdom," a strong, stable, rich, and deep roster of pitchers is the foundation of their team.
From the great Guos of the 70s and 80s, the Watanabe duo, the four great pitchers of the dynasty period that struck fear into all Nippon Professional Baseball batters, to the Heisei monster of the new century Matsuzaka Daisuke, Yongjing Xiuzhang, and Kikuchi Yuusei, it can be said that it is this unbroken succession of generation after generation of ace pitchers that has supported this team, allowing them to maintain competitiveness over many years.
By comparison, although there have been a number of erging newcors in recent years, the level of the Seibu batting line-up has ultimately lagged behind quite a bit—which is why, despite achieving good rankings during the regular season over the years, they’ve repeatedly stumbled in the climax series and found it difficult to claim the title of Japan’s Number One.
Compared to the financially strong traditional or erging forces behind the Yomiuri Giants and the SoftBank Team, Seibu’s parent company, Seibu Railways, has relatively limited financial resources, making it difficult to outcompete these opponents in the battle for foreign players and dostic free agents; most of the ti, they still have to rely on drafts and internal potential for roster supplentation.
According to the original setup, there was no doubt that the young ace of the team, Kikuchi Yuusei, should have been the starting pitcher for this ga—entering the fourth year of his professional career and his third year in the first team this season, Kikuchi had his career year with 17 appearances, 9 wins, and 4 losses, and an astonishing ERA of 1.92.
If it hadn’t been for the shoulder injury in August that led to chaotic adjustnts and eventually resulted in his season being declared over, Seibu might not have needed to strugglingly lock in a position in the climax series in the very last ga of the season—if that had been the case, this ga might actually be taking place at their ho, Seibu Do.
With the absence of this key player, Kikuchi Yuusei, Seibu’s starting pitcher lineup suddenly beca stretched: it’s not that they lack reserve pitchers, but there are few who can bear the qualifications and pressure of starting an important series ga.
Yongjing Xiuzhang has aged and can now only be used as a closer, and Seibu might not even renew his contract after this season ends;
Makita Kazuhiko has perford well this season, but the problem is he is a submariner pitcher, with an average speed of 128 km/h and a top speed of 137 km/h, which is sufficient during the regular season, but in the highly competitive climax series, especially against the aggressive batters of the SoftBank Team, Watanabe Hisashi would rather use him as a surprise weapon.
After so comparison, Takayuki Kishi, who started today, was already the best option Seibu could offer—yet who would have thought, just a few half-innings into the ga, he was brutally knocked around by SoftBank’s batters, and now his mind was probably in a daze.
Though the score gap had already widened to four points, the ga had just barely gone over four innings, far from the point where the Seibu coaching staff and players would consider giving up on the ga; Watanabe Hisashi now just hoped that Takayuki Kishi could stabilize the situation next and strive to complete five innings, which would also facilitate his subsequent pitcher deploynt.
However, for the Seibu players, they were dealing with more than just the SoftBank players—the state of the ho team in this ga was visibly getting stronger, and the fans at Yahoo Do were becoming increasingly enthusiastic.
Every ti a Seibu player was struck out by Shetsu Shou or made a defensive error, the site would explode with a huge sound, relentlessly mocking and pressuring the visiting team; similarly, whenever a ho team player hit a base hit or made an outstanding defensive play, the ho fans wouldn’t hold back their applause, passionately cheering for their players.
Amidst the new round of cheers from the ho fans, Lin Guanglai was once again the leadoff batter stepping into the batter’s box in the bottom of the fifth inning, marking his third at-bat of the ga: after hitting that solo ho run at the start, he hit a base hit as the second batter at the bottom of the third inning, and then, with the help of his teammates, scored another run.
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