“It appears their pitcher has an unfair advantage- a giant, neanderthal arm. In fact, that kid looks about 30.”
There are some kids that are just cheating on the age...but there are some who just develop much, much faster. We had a kid on our little league team that I had to catch and it was just brutal. It wasn’t just fast, it was heavy...he just through hard on every pitch. Got us to quarterfinals. Nobody could hit him. I used to put a small sponge in my palm when I had to catch him. Didn’t want it in the web, it would sometimes bend my wrist back and I’d drop it. Damn, it was a sight to see some of the poor kids who didn’t even get into the box. Wanted no part of it. Didn’t blame ‘em, but the umps used to have to tell them to move up or they’d be out of the box. Funny, haven’t thought of that for years. He was one of those guys who had a beard in hs soph year in HS.
Ha! I bet there are some kids who are really intimidating. This pitcher is one of them. I realize the angle of the photo gives his arm an optical illusion of being above normal in size, but he still looks like he’d take your head off. I was watching replays of the series and the white kids seemed slower and more interested in power offense and pitching, while the Japanese kids seemed quicker and very good on fielding skills.