Outstanding plays by three La New Bears rookies, second baseman Shih Chih-wei (
Following their 3-1 triumph over the Lions on the road last Saturday, the Bear offense turned Monday night's make-up contest against the league leaders into a batting practice by pounding out a team-high 18 hits against the Lion staff in the 13-2 slaughter.
After three scoreless frames, the Bear hitters finally found their stroke against Lion newcomer Oswaldo Mairena in the fourth when catcher Chen Fong-ming (
Rampage
The Bear offense then went on the rampage, scoring in every inning the rest of the way for a total of 13 runs against six different Lion hurlers. Lin Chih-sheng's four-RBI night just edged out fellow teammates Shih Chih-wei's 4-for-6 effort with two RBI's and first baseman Kuo Chang-ting's (
On the other side of the ball, Bear starter Cory Bailey kept the Lion lineup at bay by allowing a lone run on five hits in seven innings for his ninth win of the season. The American righty is now 9-14 with a 3.13 ERA in 24 starts and three relief appearances.
Tuesday night's contest between the Sinon Bulls and the Macoto Cobras was a classic seesaw battle that ended in a 3-3 tie after eleven innings.
Designated hitter Cheng Jing-yi's (鄭景益) run-scoring single in the top of the first would put the serpents on the board early, before his counterpart Sinon captain Huang Tung.
Chung-yi (
With one out and runners at the corners, the Cobras then took a 2-1 lead on catcher Chen Keh-fang's (
Strike again
Down 3-2, Chen Keh-fang would strike again in the seventh by lining a clean double to the left-center gap that brought home the runner from second to tie the game up at 3-3.
That was how it ended because neither team was able cross the plate again, thanks to stunning efforts by relievers from both clubs.
Four unanswered runs in the ninth helped the Cobras find their way back to the win column in their 5-3 thrilling victory over the Bulls on Wednesday. The victory not only ended the serpents' recent four-game winless skid in a hurry, it also kept them from falling to the bottom of the standings by maintaining the one-game margin over the resurging Bears.
The tough loss further exposed the Bulls' season-long problem with late-inning relief as it struggles to fill the gap that was left open with the departure of former ace closer Ramon Morel to the Japan Nippon Professional Baseball League (NPB).
"Not having a reliable closer really puts us at a disadvantage when it comes to close games. If we don't address this problem quickly, we won't be going anywhere come this postseason," Sinon skipper Chen Wei-cheng (
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier