Peng "Chia Chia" Cheng-min's league-leading 11th homer of the season sparked a 16-hit attack that lifted the Brother Elephants past the Sinon Bulls in a 10-8 triumph in Taichung on Friday night.
The premier long-ball hitter in Taiwan and winner of MVP honors for last month and March continued his red-hot hitting streak with a 3-for-4 effort and three RBIs to add to his league-leading .459 average and 30 RBIs.
Wasting little time against Bulls starting pitcher Iba Tomokazu, the Elephants rang up a pair of runs in the opening inning on a passed ball by Sinon catcher Yeh Jung-chang and an RBI-groundout by Chia Chia.
PHOTO: CHAN CHAO-YANG, TAIPEI TIMES
They would tack on seven more runs by the end of the fifth inning with a four-run fourth and three-run fifth, highlighted by two-run blasts from Chia Chia and Venezuelan newcomer Antonio Alvarez in the fourth inning.
Down 9-0, the home Bulls finally got on the board in the bottom of the fifth on a double-steal that worked to perfection before scoring three more times in the sixth to make it 9-4.
After the Elephants scored their 10th run of the contest in the top of the eighth, the Bulls would roar again with three runs in the bottom of the same inning to close within three of the men in the golden uniforms.
Su Jien-rong's one-run double off Elephants reliever Wang Jin-li made things interesting in the bottom of the ninth for the Bulls as they reduced the deficit to a deuce with the tying run at the plate.
But that was as close as they got as Wang promptly regrouped and struck out the final batter to preserve the win.
Picking up the big win was Elephants starter Liu Jung-nan, who improved to 3-2 for the year with five innings of work, allowing four runs on seven hits.
Cobras 10, Lions 4
Erupting for four hits in a six-run third, including Hsieh "the Ugly" Jia-shien's solo blast and Lin "Wild Hog" Hong-yuan's base-loaded triple, the Macoto Cobras cruised past the President Lions by a 10-4 margin in Sinjhuang on Friday evening to salvage a one-game split against the Lions.
Chang Hsien-chih also struck out a season-high 11 batters over seven solid innings to record his fourth win of the season.
The battle between the first-place Cobras and last-place Lions began with the serpents picking up a quick run in the bottom of the first on Hsieh's RBI-double off Lions starter Jeriome Robertson before Kao Wei's sharp grounder through the left side of the Lions infield knocked in the serpents' second run of the game to make it 2-0 after two innings of play.
Trailing by two, the Lions would even things up at 2-2 in the top of the third when Kao Guo-ching smashed an offering from Chang into the leftfield seats for a two-run home run.
Macoto's six-run third quickly upped the league-leaders' advantage to a lead they would keep the rest of the way, despite another two-run homer by the Lions in the seventh inning.
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