Sinon Bulls remain in the hunt for title as Elephants falter

Sinon Bulls' decisive 8-1 victory over the Brother Elephants Monday night kept the Bulls' title hopes alive as they trail behing the leaders, the President Lions, by three games in Taiwan's Chinese Professional Baseball League standings with three games left to play in the first half of the CPBL season.

Even Elephant side-armer Wu "the Bull Killer" Jung-yi (吳俊億), who had been 8-0 against the Bulls dating back to 2002, was no match against the potent bovine offense that broke open a 1-all tie in the sixth inning with three runs, on third baseman Chang Tai-shan's (張泰山) double and back-to-back RBI-singles by designated hitter Chen Wei-chih (陳威志) and left-fielder Yang Jing-hsiung (楊進雄).

The Bulls later teed off against Elephants reliever Hsiao Ren-wen (蕭任汶) for two homers in a row -- team captain Huang Chung-yi's (黃忠義) two-run shot to center and Chang Tai-shan's solo blast to the same spot.

Starting lefty Ho Chi-shien (何紀賢) was rock solid in eight frames for the Bulls by allowing one run on seven scattered hits.

He held the heart of the Elephants order to a combined 2-for-12 night while fanning four in his best performance of the season by far.

a whale of a game

Tuesday night's series opener between the Chinatrust Whales and the La New Bears did not have any bearing as far as the first-half title race, but the two squads treated Chiayi fans to a 5-4 nail-biter in favor of the Whales.

The Whales jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first following a sharp ground ball by cleanup man Chen Jien-wei (陳建偉), which brought in a run.

They then quickly lost their advatage as the Bears scored a run in the second, third, and fourth innings to take a 3-1 lead.

Whales slugger Huang Kwei-yu (黃貴裕) then evened things up at 3-3 in the bottom of the fourth as he crushed a pitch by Bears starter Liang Rue-hao (梁如豪) 10 rows into the left-field bleachers. The Whales then added two more runs on catcher Shih Jin-sho's (石金受) two-run bomb to cap off a four-run fourth inning that gave them a 5-3 lead.

The Bears would close the gap to 5-4 in the sixth inning with designated hitter Tsai Hung-tseh's (蔡泓澤) RBI-single up the middle, but that was as close as the Bears would get because the Whales relievers kept the scoring door shut the rest of the way.

Former Major Leaguer Dan Harriger of the US yielded a run on six hits in eight steady innings en route to his first win of the season with the Whales.

Upcoming Games

With the first-half title still up for grabs, a pair of three-game series between the Lions and the Bulls and the Macoto Cobras and the Elephants this week will determine which club will take home the title.

The second-place Elephants need to sweep the serpents and hope for the Bulls to do the same against the big cats in order to win the first half.

The odds, of course, are against such sweeps taking place.

The Lions haven't been swept in a series all season long, which means the Elephants are likely to end up being only the third team in 13 years of Taiwan professional baseball history to fail to win the first half despite being the first team to reach the 20-game-win plateau.

The Lions can wrap up the first half with a tie or better in their three-game series against the Bulls for the right to play in the postseason, something they had missed for the past two seasons.