The President Lions continued their dominance over the Brother Elephants this season with a 9-3 victory at home in Tainan on Saturday night to sweep the two-game series.
The win not only gave the top-ranked cats a perfect 4-0 record for the week, but also boosted their lead over the second-place La New Bears in the standings to two full games.
Leading the way for the tenacious Lions attack was a heart of an order consisting of Liu Fu-hao, Kao Guo-ching, and Tilson Brito, whose combined 5-for-11 hitting with five RBIs accounted for the bulk of the team’s run production on the night.
Homering for the second straight game and picking up four RBIs along with way was Brito who was named the game-MVP by a unanimous decision for his contribution to the victory.
Taking the mound in his first start since May 2006 was fireballer Lin Yueh-ping whose miraculous return to action within a year after undergoing an open-heart surgery last season was outdone by five solid innings of work as he recorded his win in a starting role in nearly 24 months.
“It was a big win for me given what has happened to me over the past two years,” Lin said.
He would leave the game after fifth having allowed a lone run on three hits with three strikeouts and five walks.
Other than a shaky first, in which he allowed a run on a hit and three walks, Lin managed to pitch out of trouble despite allowing runners to reach second in all but one inning.
Standing opposite of Lin was his counterpart Liao Yu-cheng whose bid to for his fifth win of the year fell short over a losing cause as the Lions offense struck for five runs on six hits off the submariner to chase him after the fifth.
Trailing 1-9 after eight innings of play, the Elephants would string together one final offensive in the ninth that led to two unearned runs off the Lions’ Gregory Wiltshire. But that was too little too late as the Lions promptly regrouped to prevent any further damage from occurring.
Whales 6, Bulls 3
Behind a three RBIs by sleeper Tseng Jia-shien on a perfect 2-for-2 night, the Chinatrust Whales doubled up on the Sinon Bulls in a 6-3 decision at the Chiayi Municipal Baseball Stadium on Saturday for their first back-to-back wins since March 23rd.
Lefty ace Nee Fu-deh also pitched brilliantly for five scoreless innings before losing his shutout bid in a two-run sixth to pick up his second win of the season.
Miscues on the part of the Sinon defense that led to four of the Whales’ six runs during the second and third being unearned ultimately cost the home Bulls the game even though they actually outhit the Whales by a slight 11-10 margin.
Falling victim to such shaky defensive effort was Bulls starter Yang Jien-fu who was charged with all six of the Whales runs (only two earned) on seven hits in just 2-2/3 innings of work to drop a dismal 1-3 mark for the year.
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