The Genius Hitter Who Conquered America - Chapter 121

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 121
An old pickup truck roared down the road, its engine sputtering loudly.
Hank gripped the steering wheel with a fierce intensity, and after stealing several sidelong glances at Soo-ho sitting in the passenger seat, he let out a series of deep, weary sighs as if the earth itself were collapsing beneath him.
“Geez. What in the world is wrong with your physique?”
A blunt, tactless jab delivered without hesitation.
Yet Soo-ho felt no offense, merely chuckling softly and nodding in agreement.
Honestly, from Hank’s perspective, my current condition must have looked pathetic.
He was a nutritionist sent directly by the Dodgers Organization, a symbol of capital and resources.
‘The Major League players he’d managed exclusively must have possessed absolutely perfect physiques.’
The ideal that American Baseball pursued.
Compared to those massive, rippling muscular frames, my lean body could only appear as a scrawny Asian kid.
That’s why I responded with a good-natured smile, meeting his bluntness with gentleness.
“I apologize. That’s precisely why I desperately need your help, Hank.”
For me, lowering my head for the sake of my goals was the easiest thing in the world.
Unnecessary pride could simply be discarded.
‘Rather than fumbling through nutrition textbooks and wasting precious time searching for diet plans online, it’s far better to leverage an expert.’
That was the fastest and most certain path to establishing myself on the Major League stage.
As long as I could seize the ultimate success, such humility dealt me no real damage.
Moreover, I already harbored absolute faith in the organization’s specialists—a conviction that had taken root deep within me.
During my Low-A days, Hitting Coach Alex had single-handedly provided the answer to my batting mechanics that had seemed hopelessly stuck.
By trusting and absorbing everything he taught me then, I’d been able to achieve my entry into the 40-Man Roster.
That’s why I was fully prepared to entrust my body to this rustic, blunt nutritionist who drove this old truck.
Perhaps Hank appreciated my shrewd and earnest response?
The corners of his mouth twitched upward.
“Ha. I’ve seen countless idiots who make the 40-Man Roster and immediately get cocky, casting their first pitch before they’ve even learned to walk. But you—you at least understand your position. I like that.”
After that, Hank pushed his worn sunglasses up and began launching into a full-fledged monologue.
His voice brimmed with absolute conviction and fervor about his philosophy.
“Listen up, kid. There are plenty of nutritionists out there, but those bastards locked away in air-conditioned labs are nothing but walking calculators.”
It was a surprisingly harsh criticism directed at me.
Yet Hank didn’t seem to care, spitting out the window with a derisive snort.
“Those idiots only believe in numbers and science. How many grams of protein, how many calories. That’s just a manual for fixing broken machinery. Is the human body a machine?”
Hank continued without pause.
“Cattle or pigs sold at supermarkets? They’re raised in cramped pens, never walking, eating only the feed they’re given their whole lives. What do you think happens when you break down their components and shove them into your body like it’s some kind of science? Sure, your body gets bigger. But that’s just lazy fat. Your flexibility—the agility you need to maintain—dies, and your body becomes as rigid as a log.”
I blinked slowly.
I’d thought he was simply an uncouth country bumpkin, but his philosophy, though rough-hewn, possessed a strange persuasiveness.
“I don’t believe in that garbage about numbers or research papers. Let those intellectuals who love flexing their brains believe in that. What I believe in is one thing and one thing only: the wild and survival.”
“Pardon?”
“You said you need to maintain speed and flexibility, right? Then the answer is simple. The muscles of creatures that sprint and survive in the raw wilderness, fighting for their lives. You need to consume that explosive, primal energy, and then your body will remember it and move like a beast.”
Beyond merely calculating the components and calories of food.
It was an extraordinary concept—that one must consume the very instinctive energy itself that ingredients had accumulated through survival in nature.
But it was truly beyond all reason.
Even if my baseball career had been short.
‘I’ve never heard of anything like this before….’
It was the perfect moment for unwavering faith to crumble into doubt.
At least for me.
And so.
“S-so, where are we going right now?”
“Where else? The sea first.”
“Y-yes?”
The sea, of all places….
“What will I be doing there?”
“You’ll find out soon enough.”
Though I couldn’t make heads or tails of any of this, I kept my mouth shut.
I had to trust him.
He seemed like an even bigger eccentric than Alex—I could call the Dodgers right now and demand they change my nutritionist.
Honestly, I wanted to do exactly that.
Why else would they have assigned Hank to me?
‘There has to be a reason.’
No. There had to be.
But if I ever felt this man was truly wrong for me.
Then I’d speak up quickly and ask for a change.
* * *
How long had I been sitting in this rattling, decrepit pickup truck?
The salt-tinged air and the harsh sound of crashing waves greeted me.
It was truly the sea.
And a weathered dock at some remote, secluded harbor.
“Get out.”
Following Hank out of the truck, I was left speechless by the sight before me.
At the dock, accompanied by the cries of gulls, sat a single dilapidated vessel so rusted it wouldn’t have been surprising if it sank on the spot.
Thunk.
“Change into these.”
What Hank pulled from the truck bed and tossed to me were thick rubber waterproof overalls.
The kind fishermen wore—waders.
I awkwardly squeezed into the heavy, musty-smelling garment.
Then I recalled the conversation I’d just had with the Team Player Support Division.
‘Since it’s the off-season, would you like to take a vacation somewhere warm? Shall we book you a luxury hotel suite at your preferred resort right away? First-class tickets are already prepared!’
Just hours ago, I’d been a coveted member of the 40-Man Roster, offered luxury hotels and first-class airfare.
Yet somehow I’d been dragged to the sea and was about to board a shrimp boat dressed like a fisherman.
“Hey, Captain! Let’s set sail!”
As Hank shouted toward the wheelhouse, the entire vessel trembled as if struck by an earthquake, belching thick black smoke.
Vroom!
With a rough engine roar, the fishing boat cut sharply through the waves and began moving toward the middle of the sea.
Standing on the swaying deck, drenched in salt spray, I finally couldn’t contain my curiosity any longer and opened my mouth.
“Um… excuse me.”
“What!”
“Why are we taking the boat out?”
“Why? To catch ingredients for your stomach, that’s why.”
“Then… are you saying we’re fishing right now?”
“That’s right.”
Hank answered casually, tapping fishing rods and traps with his foot.
I was dumbfounded.
No matter how much he valued the wildness of ingredients.
In a period where every second of training mattered, did it really make sense for a player to go out on a boat and fish?
As my expression hardened into one of utter bewilderment, Hank stared at me over his sunglasses and spoke.
“Why the complaint? You’re a baseball player. And even though it’s the off-season now, you still need to train simultaneously.”
“…I suppose so.”
“So what I’m doing with you will help your training just a little bit.”
I doubted my own ears.
No. A baseball player’s off-season training is fishing?
I couldn’t understand it at all.
When swinging bats and lifting barbells weren’t even enough, how could catching fish in cold sea breeze help baseball?
Thousands of question marks floated through my mind.
But Hank, showing no inclination to explain further, simply stood at the bow and gazed at the rough waves.
I bit my lip.
‘Fine, let me just experience this firsthand.’
What was this crazy nutritionist trying to teach me?
What absurd secret lay hidden between fishing and batting?
The shrimp boat, roaring loudly, cut through the sea and soon came to a stop in the middle of the open ocean.
As the boat rocked on the rough waves, Hank grabbed something from the corner and tossed it to me.
“Use this.”
What I caught without thinking was a crude sea fishing rod.
Holding the weathered cork handle bearing the marks of time and the heavy reel, I still regarded Hank with a complicated expression.
“I’ve never fished a day in my life.”
“So what? You catch what goes into your stomach yourself!”
“Excuse me?”
“If you can’t catch anything, there’s no dinner for you! You can just drink seawater!”
Excuse me? Hank? Aren’t you a nutritionist? Is it okay to starve people?
It was absurd, but I couldn’t exactly turn the boat around in the middle of the sea.
‘Fine, let me trust him a bit longer.’
I closed my mouth and carefully observed Hank’s actions.
He skillfully threaded the bait onto the hook, released the reel, and cast the line into the sea with a fluid motion.
I watched that movement carefully, then baited my own hook and cast my line toward the water.
Some time passed.
The tip of my fishing rod, which had been still, began to tremble faintly—tap, tap.
My senses were sharp.
This wasn’t the vibration from the boat being rocked by waves.
I immediately recognized that something beneath the surface had touched my bait.
‘Did I hook it?’
I quickly reeled in.
But when the hook broke the surface, there was no fish—
not even the bait I’d so carefully threaded remained.
A complete miss.
I turned to Hank beside me with a bewildered expression.
My eyes pleaded for help—why had this happened, and when exactly was I supposed to set the hook?
But Hank merely glanced at me sideways and snorted.
“Heh!”
A clear mockery, unmistakable to anyone’s ears.
His attitude was blatant disdain—figure it out yourself, he seemed to say to this pathetic beginner.
But what was this supposed to mean?
In that instant, my eyes changed.
‘I’ll catch one, no matter what.’
I was ordinarily endlessly kind and gentle.
I rarely grew angry with others.
But beneath that lay a ferocious competitive spirit.
A professional baseball player who had overcome failure and shattered the narrow gate of the 40-Man Roster to rise.
For someone like me, who had battled and defeated monsters on the baseball field, defeat and surrender were the most abhorrent words.
Even if the sport had changed to fishing.
I had no intention of backing down quietly after hearing this madman’s mockery.
I baited my hook again and cast my line into the sea.
But contrary to my determination, fishing—something I’d never done before—proved far from easy.
The cunning fish continued to steal my bait and escape.
Especially since no one had properly taught me the technique, failure kept repeating itself.
Before long, I’d lost my bait more than ten times.
But I didn’t break.
Instead, I narrowed my eyes even sharper and focused all my attention on the tip of the rod.
‘It doesn’t matter if no one teaches me.’
It had always been this way.
From my days at the Orphanage to when I first arrived in the United States.
‘No one ever spoon-fed me the answers.’
Yet I observed and tried far more than others, and eventually I found my own answers.
If you persist without giving up and keep digging deeper, you’re bound to succeed eventually—it’s inevitable.
Soo-ho stood there in silence, failing repeatedly yet unwavering, his grip on the fishing rod steady and resolute.
Hank gazed out at the distant horizon like an old man who had seen everything the world had to offer, but a faint smile played at the corners of his mouth.
It seemed Soo-ho’s relentless tenacity and persistence had genuinely impressed him.
Hank broke the silence with a casual remark.
“Tsk, tsk. A baseball player who can’t time things properly like that…”
Soo-ho’s hands froze.
“Timing?”
At his question, Hank gestured toward the end of the fishing rod with a jut of his chin and spoke curtly.
“When a fish nibbles at the bait, you don’t just recklessly snatch it up—you’ll only lose the bait. A pitcher doesn’t just mindlessly extend his bat the moment the pitcher lifts his leg, does he?”
“…!”
“Read the tension transmitted through your fingertips and the flow of the water. Then, only when the bite is perfectly set, at that precise moment, you pull with explosive force. It’s exactly like barrel control. The one who moves first loses. Understand?”
In that instant, lightning struck through Soo-ho’s mind.
This wasn’t just some idle pastime to catch dinner.
The patience of waiting for a pitcher’s throw, the sense of timing measured amid taut tension.
And the process of gathering all your power in your fingertips and unleashing it in a single, explosive swing.
All of it aligned with the mechanics of the batter’s box in a way that sent chills down his spine.
It wasn’t merely about consuming wild protein.
It was a calculated method to maintain the delicate sensations of hitting—the very nuances easily lost during the process of building muscle—through fishing itself.
Watching Hank’s weathered silhouette standing beside the wheelhouse, Soo-ho silently clicked his tongue in admiration.
‘Is he eccentric? Or is he a genius?’
Or perhaps both?
Either way!
Now that I understood the principle, it was time to reap the rewards.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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