Wu Si-yo got an unconventional 3-0 shutout win in Kaohsiung for the La New Bears Wednesday evening with some help from Mother Nature as a sudden downpour forced the game against the Chinatrust Whales to end in the top of the eighth inning.
Wu, who had been bothered by a waist injury earlier in the season, was rock solid in seven scoreless innings, allowing five hits while fanning eight and walking three.
The victory marked his fourth straight (second shutout win in a row) for the promising second-year lefty as he improved to 5-2 for the year.
The game began with the Whales threatening in the bottom of the first inning, putting runners on second and third with one out after a leadoff single by outfielder Chi Jung-lin and an error by the Bears defense that put Wu in a jam right off the bat. But he would quickly settled in and strike out the next two batters to end the Whales' early threat.
Offensively for the Bears, catcher Chen Fong-ming got his team on the board with a run-scoring double in the top of the second before fellow slugger Lu Jung-hsiung connected for an RBI single up the middle in the fourth to give the Bears a 2-0 lead.
La New first baseman Pan Chung-wei made it 3-0 in the fifth with his opposite-field liner that brought home the runner from third to conclude all the scoring for the his team on a night where the Bears rang up 13 hits against the Whales staff.
Newcomer Wascar Serrano of the Dominican Republic did not have his best stuff, but managed to keep his team in the game by allowing just three runs on 14 hits in seven innings of work. He was tagged with the loss for his offense's inability to provide any kind of run support, dropping him to 1-2 in the four games that he had started since joining the Whales in late July.
Elephants 3, Cobras 3
Elephants manager Lin Yi-tseng's double-steal in the bottom of the eighth worked to perfection as the Elephants squeezed a run off Macoto reliever Rene Miniel to force a 3-3 tie in a makeup game against the Cobras at Taichung Monday night.
The Elephants fell behind twice in the game and were able to come back on both occasions thanks to All-Star slugger Peng "Chia Chia" Cheng-ming, who single-handedly carried his team in the game with a sixth-inning, solo blast off Cobras starter Yang Chi-jia to even the score at 2-all and a base hit with three stolen bases in the eighth to score the game-tying run on the double-steal.
A lack of clutch hitting by the potent Macoto lineup could muster only three runs on the 13 hits it pounded off the Elephants pitching, stranding a total of 16 runners (nine in scoring position) for the game.
Bulls 9, Elephants 2
The Elephants' luck ran out in Thursday's contest against the Sinon Bulls when the defending champs made good on their 14 hits to plate a total of nine runs in a 9-2 final at Taichung.
Trailing the Elephants 2-1 after four innings of play, the Bulls sent eight men to the plate in a four-run fifth, capped by veteran second baseman Huang "Brother Tung" Chung-yi's two-run double, to take the lead for good.
Bulls starter Tsai Chung-nan upped his record to 4-2 for the year with another sound effort off the mound in allowing two runs on four hits over five innings of work.
The loss by the Elephants ended starter Bronswell Patrick's winning streak at three games as the American righty suffered his first defeat of the season to fall to 3-1.
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