"And today, this guy's state is a bit crazy!"
Sawamura muttered with a deep feeling.
Before his regression, he had been teammates with Lincoln for two years and rivals for nearly a decade...
Since both had a unique set of batting skills, they had faced off many times.
Lincoln had his own rhythm, and it was very relaxed. Before you knew it, his opponents were buried under his pace.
Fans affectionately called him the Gentle Reaper.
But the Lincoln in front of him felt completely different.
'It was as if something had triggered him.'
He seemed to be acting very proactively.
For a baseball player to show initiative isn't a bad thing, but when it disrupts his own rhythm, it becomes a different story.
And the Lincoln in front of him had clearly disrupted his own rhythm.
Although his performance was still excellent, Sawamura always felt something was missing.
"It's like he's lacking his own style."
Although Eijun thought that Lincoln was missing something now, his performance was still very strong.
In the following confrontations, Lincoln successfully struck out three batters, including first-year students Yuuki and Yui.
Finally, he forced Maezono to hit a pop fly ball.
This led to Seidou High School being three up, three down.
The game was an intense back-and-forth battle.
Soon, it was the bottom of the fourth inning.
By this time, the American team had already extended their lead to four Runs.
The situation was two Outs, with runners on first and third base.
Seidou High School's collapse seemed imminent.
Sweat beads the size of beans flowed down from Nishiyama's forehead.
The game had only been through four innings, but Nishiyama seemed like he had already exhausted all his energy.
'So tired…'
'Really, so tired!!!'
His arms and thighs felt like they weren't even his own anymore.
They wouldn't obey him at all.
The ball's speed had slowed down, and his overall momentum had dropped significantly.
Nishiyama had never felt this exhausted during a game. Not even during the previous World Series or the matches against the strong teams from Tokyo.
As a rotational pitcher, he had seen his fair share of high-level games.
Nishiyama had always believed that his skills had reached a certain level.
But now, it seemed like he had overestimated himself.
When facing off against the world's top players, he could clearly feel his powerlessness.
'The gap was just too big!'
On the surface, it appeared that the Texas team was centered around Lincoln.
But to underestimate the other players on the Texas team would be a huge mistake.
The players standing before him had been selected from all over Texas, and every single one of them deserved to be called outstanding.
When facing each one of them, Nishiyama had to exert all his strength.
Yet, sometimes, even when giving his all, he felt powerless in the face of these seemingly monstrous opponents.
Even the professional baseball players didn't seem this insanely powerful, did they?
Deep down, Nishiyama felt that the current situation was highly abnormal.
But if he were to explain exactly what was abnormal, he couldn't say for sure.
In the end, it was just a feeling of his.
Nishiyama had never felt so useless, not even for a moment, as he did now.
Meanwhile, in the dugout, both Sawamura and Miyuki, who hadn't been called to play, exchanged surprised glances.
"Nishiyama is indeed a player born for big moments."
"How could he possibly hold his ground against these monsters from Texas?"
It was clear that the strength gap between the teams was huge.
The weaker side could easily be crushed by the opposing team's overwhelming strength.
For Nishiyama to hold on under such circumstances, even if he had given up a few points along the way, was already a remarkable feat.
Yet, Nishiyama managed to stabilize the situation.
"OUT!"
With two Outs and runners on first and third base, Nishiyama, despite being physically drained, turned the game around with a fishing pitch.
He forced the Texas batter to hit a fly ball.
He perfectly closed out the fourth inning.
The score was still 4:0.
This performance was already very impressive.
Among the players who had taken the field, only Kuramochi's performance stood out. The rest of the team members' performances likely didn't measure up to Nishiyama's.
At this point, Coach Kataoka made a decision to make substitutions.
It was unclear what he was thinking,
but at this time, he brought Sawamura and Miyuki onto the field.
The score difference was four points!
So far, the Seidou High School players hadn't figured out how to handle Lincoln.
Even with Sawamura and Miyuki on the field, Seidou's chances of winning weren't high.
Even if they managed to hold the line and prevent further runs, simply not conceding more wasn't enough to turn the game around.
They would need at least five runs to have a chance.
With five innings left, scoring five runs against Lincoln seemed almost impossible...
The Seidou High baseball team wasn't very optimistic.
They didn't know exactly what Coach Kataoka had been planning, but it seemed like the substitution came a bit late.
After witnessing the opponent's strength in the first inning, they should have made the substitution then.
Being two points behind, Seidou High could have still had a chance to reverse the situation with Sawamura and Miyuki leading them.
But now, with the game halfway through, finding such an opportunity seemed nearly impossible, especially with such a large score gap.
To put it bluntly, even if Sawamura hit a home run every time from now on, he could at most get two Runs, given that he was still a pitcher.
Furthermore, the batting order had just rotated, so Sawamura had just finished his turn.
Nishiyama was batting third, and Sawamura would naturally take his place in the same spot.
By the time the top of the fourth inning came, Nishiyama had just finished his turn at bat.
The situation was one-sided, and the players were filled with worry.
Sawamura was curious about what had triggered Lincoln to play so fiercely.
'What had spurred him on?'
Without anyone revealing the truth, Sawamura would likely find it difficult to get an answer.
What he didn't know was that, at this very moment, an older man with half-white hair was sitting in the stands watching the game.
If Sawamura had encountered this man, he would have felt an immediate sense of familiarity.
The man was Coach Abel of the Major League's team.
The Coach of the Chicago White Sox!
He was also one of Sawamura's benefactors, aside from Coach Kataoka.
During Sawamura's dark two years in the Major League, it was Abel who pulled him out of the mud.
It was also Abel who saw Sawamura's potential and helped him get signed by the White Sox's big boss after he graduated from high school.
This time, Abel had come to watch this exchange game as well.
Naturally, the Texas team, as the host, had received this information early on.
Their Coach immediately contacted the team's top star, Lincoln.
"Lincoln! This is good news, you must perform well in this exchange game!"
After explaining the situation, the Texas Coach told Lincoln this.
With that, Lincoln's insane performance was easily explained.
He couldn't afford to go all out, as this game was crucial for his future career.
What no one knew, however, was that Abel didn't travel all this way just to watch the Texas team's star player.
He was actually here to watch another player who had greatly caught his interest.
...