The Chinatrust Whales rallied from four down to top league-leading President Lions 6-5 in Sinjhuang on Saturday night.
Shih Jin-sho's walk-off sacrifice fly to right with the bases loaded and one out scored the winning run that capped a five-run rally for the Whales as they humbled the Lions who missed a golden opportunity to add to their lead over the second-place La New Bears with a late-game collapse.
Trailing 1-5 heading into the bottom of the ninth, the Whales comeback began with Yeh Chang-long lining a single off Lin Yueh-ping and Hsu Ren-jeh knocking him home with a clean double to left to chase Lin.
Wang Yi-min's blooper to left that dropped for a base hit off the Lions' Tsao Jung-yang placed runners at the corners before a chopper to second on the ensuing play was mishandled to gift the Whales' second run of the inning.
Another run-scoring single and a poor throw to third by the Lions pitcher on a sacrifice bunt attempt cut the lead to one before Kuo Dai-yong's opposite-field singles knotted things up, setting the stage for Shih's clincher.
It was the biggest lead that the Lions bullpen had given up all season and hardly the time to do it either, especially with the second-place Bears making a strong push to chip away at the once-four game lead for the Lions, cut to only one-and-a-half after Saturday's loss.
Lions starter Pan "Du Du" Wei-luen pitched six solid innings of one-run ball on eight hits seem well on his way to win his record-setting 16th straight when he left the game with a 4-1 lead.
Instead, it was the Whales' Lorenzo Barcelo who ran away with the win for his one-and-a-third innings of one-hit relief.
Pocketing the loss was Tsao who allowed three runs (only one earned) in the ninth for his seventh setback of the year.
Bulls 7, Elephants 6
There was plenty of drama on Saturday in a contest that featured three lead changes before the home Bulls prevailed in a 7-6 thriller over the Brother Elephants.
Chen Chih-wei's clutch single with the bases intentionally loaded after Lin Tsung-nan's leadoff triple, scored the game-winner that avoided what would have been a huge letdown for the Bulls as they failed to finish off the Elephants by surrendering two in the top of the ninth.
Early success by the Elephants lineup led to four quick runs through the top of the fourth against Sinon starter Yang Jien-fu, highlighted by Chen Huai-shan's solo home run in the second and Chen "the Golden Warrior" Chih-yuan's RBI single in the fourth.
The Bulls halved the 4-0 lead in the bottom of the fourth with a pair of runs off Elephants starter Yeh Ding-ren before hitting him up for two more in the fifth to make it 4-4.
Chang "Prince of the Forest" Tai-shan's solo blast off Brother reliever Wang Jing-li gave the Bulls a 5-4 lead in the seventh followed by Yu Hsien-ming's run-producing groundout in the eighth.
However, the Elephants rallied to 6-6 in the top of the ninth with two runs off Sinon closer Kuo Yong-chih in Kuo's second blown save in three chances.
Kuo's offense bailed him out with the game-winner in the bottom of the inning to give him his second win of the year.
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