6/11/2004
6/11/2004
| Box Scores Here; Click on to Numbers on Scoreboard |
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| Tokyo The Hiroshima Carp were already ahead
of the Yomiuri Giants Friday before the start of the ninth inning 4-3,
but Carp pinch hitter Itsuki Asai drove a shot into the seats with the
bases loaded in the top of the frame to stave off any hopes of a Giants
comeback in an 8-5 final. John Bale started for the winners and picked
up the shiroboshi with seven strong innings of five hit, three run (two
earned) ball.
Kimiyasu Kudoh made his 400th career start as a pro for Yomiuri and was tagged for three runs in five innings on four hits to accept blame for the defeat. By the way, he is the 17th hurler to that number of game opening assignments. Kudoh had control problems in the first and paid the price, as he
walked second baseman Greg LaRocca and shortstop Andy Sheets with
Bale struckout the side in the bottom half and then added two more
whiffs in the third as he spun four perfect innings. In the fifth, his
teammates got him another run to work with, when centerfielder Koichi Ogata
singled to left with two outs and stole second and
The Giants got off the shnide in the home segment, though. Rightfielder Yoshinobu Takahashi reached on Bale's error. The next two men struckout, but catcher Shinnosuke Abe whistled one down the leftfield line for a double. Shortstop Tomohiro Nioka outran a ground ball toward third and Takahashi crossed to cut the deficit to 3-1 Carp. Hiroshi Sato came on for Yomiuri to begin the sixth and, with one out, Hiroshima first baseman Kenta Kurihara homered to leftcenter on a slider and it was 4-1. Balk struckout two more in the Giants turn in the inning, but then got hurt in the seventh. Takahashi singled to left. Giants manager Tsuneo Horiuchi called for the hit and run play. First baseman Roberto Petagine struckout and Takahashi was dead meat at second. Third baseman Hiroki Kokubo tapped a little ground ball near short and slid headfirst into first safely. Bale plunked Abe. Nioka doubled to rightcenter to chase Kokubo and Abe home and it was 4-3. But in the ninth, Hiroshima reserve leftfielder Takuya Kimura singled to right and was erased on a ground ball back to reliever Matt Randel by Ogata, who went to second for the force. Ogata advanced on a subsequent groundout. LaRocca was wisely intentionally walked. However, Sheets worked a free pass and the bagus were juiced. Asai was sent up to hit for reliever Shinji Sasaoka. Randel aimed to spot his fastball on the inside corner, but instead it floated into Asai's red zone and he blistered it into the rightfield seats to make it 8-3 Hiroshima. It was the 72nd pinch hit slam in Japanese history and the 13th by a Carp in that team's annals. It was the first pinch granny in the Central League this season. Kan Otake pitched well in the bottom portion, but some shoddy play behind him really hampred things. Takahashi singled to center and Petagine grounded to Andy Sheets, who booted it. Kokubo walked and the sacks were packed. Catcher Shinnosuke Abe grounded to third baseman Kenjiro Nomura, who also flubbed it trying to trigger a double play and threw it away to score two. Now the tying run was up in the form of Nioka, but he struckout, as did pinch hitter Koji Goto. Second baseman Toshihisa Nishi grounded to Sheets for the third out and it was finally over for the 8-5 final. Hiroshima is now in third. Kurihara is now hitting .370 against Yomiuri this season after cracking
two more hits with five homers and 11 RBIs. Just at Tokyo Dome,
The last time a Hiroshima hitter had a pinch hit grand slam was by Kojiro Machida in 2001. Bale did something that only one other man in Japanese has done and
that other hurler is a hall of famer. He has now racked up three consecutive
ten strikeouts or more games against Yomiuri. The last time the Giants
were so victmized was back in 1960 by Kokutetsu Swallows ace Masaichi Kaneda.
Bale whiffed 33 Giants batters during this run. Apparently the Yomiuri
lineup is having trouble picking
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Team Reports
| Hanshin | |
| The Tigers are said to be in the market for a foreign starting pitcher.
Sankei Sports says that Hanshin will not go after Koo Dae-sung, but instead
may bring in Texas pitcher Ricardo Rodriguez or another of the ten names
they have a on a shortlist. That would seem to be missing the boat, though
since their main problem lately as been an inability to score runs. Just
ask Keiichi Yabu.
Shortstop Atsushi Fujimoto is attempting to cure his tendency to uppercut the ball when he is going bad by practicing like he's going |
o bunt and then pulling the bat back into the hitting position.
Stat of the day: Centerfielder Norihiro Akahoshi is hitting only .189 against Yokohama, a big reason why the Tigers have had little success against them this year. First baseman George Arias has started taking batting practice again,
but he still can't run due to a bad hammy.
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| Chunichi | |
| The Dragons sent an army of scouts out Friday, 13 in all, to watch
Nihon University pitcher Takumi Nasuno, who tossed a four hit 1-0 shutout
at Kanagawa University. He hasn't allowed a run in 39 innings. Seibu Lions
infielder Taketoshi Goto's brother, Kitaro, is on that Kanagawa squad and
went hitless.
Masahiro Yamamoto will start in an upcoming game in Akita and hopes to make it 18 ballparks in which he has registered a win when |
the Dragons faceoff against Yakult at Komachi Stadium.
Also on the draft front, the Dragons are said to be interested in
Japan Rail Higashi Nihon catcher Yoshio Koyama. Koyama caught Daisuke Matsuzaka
at Yokohama High and Katsutoshi Nagakawa and Hiroshi Kisanuki at Asia University.
Manager Hiromitsu Ochiai likes his leadership ability and his bat. He will
likely be taken in a low round.
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| Yomiuri | |
| Kazuhiro Kiyohara sat out another game due to his bad back. In fact, the pain got so bad Friday morning that his wife wanted to call an ambulance. A doctor's exam determined that Kiyohara has an | intestinal gas problem that is causing the backache and it requires rest. |
| Yakult | |
| Outfielder Atsunori Inaba will be eligible for free agency sometime in July and the Swallows want to keep him around even with the array of injuries he has had over the last three years. So they are | reportedly preparing a three year deal worth a total of 500 million
yen (about $4.5 million). |
| Hiroshima | |
| Pitcher Tom Davey is going to need surgery on his shoulder and is gone for the year. The Carp have begun looking for another foreign | pitcher, though mainly for the bullpen. |
| Yokohama | |
| Takashi Saito has been taken off the roster so that he can prepare himself for going making his living again in the bullpen. The Stars pen has only allowed three runs in its last 15 innings and Kazuhiro | Sasaki, despite a diminished fastball, has been nails in the closer's role, so this will only make things better. However, what are they going to do about his rotation spot? |
| Miscellaneous | |
| San Diego reliever Akinori Otsuka tossed two perfect innings on
24 pitches Friday against the New York Yankees for his second big league
save. He got a chance to face Yankees leftfielder Hideki Matsui and induced
a flyout on a 94mph fastball. The last time the
two had faced each other was during the ninth inning of game two of the 1998 all star series on July 23rd of that year, as Otsuka got Matsui to break his bat and ground out on that occasion. The former Dragona and Buffalo has a 1.17 ERA IN 29 games and is making his case for the all star team. Yanks skipper called Otsuka's pitches "impressive" and noted that he has "explosive stuff." Matsui ended up going 0-4 on the night as the Yankees foru game win streak went asunder. Japanese singer Hiroko Kokubu was at the game. Mets shortstop Kazuo Matsui didn't start Friday, but was inserted as a pinch hitter and ended up with a 2-2 evening against Kansas City. Between Japan and MLB, the former Seibu infielder's consecutive games streak is at 1203 and counting. |
Seattle outfielder Ichiro Suzuki went 1-3 Friday against Montreal
at (insurance company) Field to extend his on base string to 38 games in
a 1-0 sayonara victory. He also had a walk and a steal. The MLB record
for most straight games reaching base safely is 84 by Ted Williams in 1949.
On that skein, Ichiro said, "fasn don't care about it, so I don't either."
St. Louis minor league outfielder So Taguchi went 0-5 for Memphis against Omaha Friday. Angels minor league pitcher Yoshitaka Mizuo wasa hammered for four runs on six hits in 2.2 innings Friday against Sacramento. The Central League announced that attendance is up 7% over last season, with Hanshin's 17.6% increase driving that boost.
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