Wang Jin-yong’s infield single with the bases loaded capped a two-run rally in the bottom of the eighth as the Brother Elephants turned a 0-1 deficit into a 2-1 win over the Chinatrust Whales at the Hsinchu Municipal Baseball Stadium on Friday night.
Trailing 0-1 for most of the game, the men in the golden uniform finally came to life in the eighth by taking first on a hit batsman that chased Whales starter Kao Min-jing before tying the game on a sacrifice-fly by Chen Chih-yuan and loading up the bases with two outs to set up Wang’s game-turning hit.
A fielding error by the Elephants shortstop, coupled with a wild pitch by starter Kobayashi Ryokan gave the marine creatures an early 1-0 lead in the opening frame.
PHOTO: LIU HSIN-DE, TAIPEI TIMES
That would be the only run that either club scored for the next seven innings in the classic pitchers’ duel between Kao and Kobayashi that saw Kao take a two-hit shutout into the eighth and Kobayashi allowing an unearned run in a five-hitter through the seventh before the Elephants struck for two in the eighth to win the game.
The Whales outhit the Elephants 6-3, but failed to produce any runs as they batted a futile 0-for-4 with runners in scoring position to lose the heartbreaker.
Picking up the surprising win was Elephants reliever Mai Jia-rei, who pitched a scoreless eighth and ninth on a hit and two strikeouts to even his season mark at 2-2, while his counterpart Huang Hong-ren was tagged with the loss for loading up the bags in the eighth on a hit batsman and two walks to set the stage for Wang’s game-winning hit.
T-Rex 12, Bulls 3
An eight-run sixth by the dmedia T-Rex broke a 3-3 tie wide open and the T-Rex went on to defeat the Sinon Bulls 12-3 at the Taipei County Baseball Stadium in Sinjhuang on Friday, giving manager Lin Kuen-wei a big win in his managerial debut.
Following the coaching shuffle that had former manager Liu Jia-chi swapping roles with Lin, the former pitching coach, to finish out the season, the T-Rex were eager to show what they could do for the rookie skipper.
And the eight-run sixth could not have come at a better time for them as they tallied up a half-dozen singles and four walks against three different Sinon hurlers to humble the Bulls.
After the T-Rex took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second on an RBI-single by Chen Keh-fan, the Bulls answered with three runs of their own in the top of the fifth to claim a 3-1 advantage.
Wang Chuan-jia’s rare triple that scored the T-Rex’s second run of the game quickly brought hope to the hosts before they tied the game up two batters later on a blooper single by Napoleon Calzado to set the table for the big inning in the sixth.
T-Rex starter Cory Bailey was credited with his second win of the season for pitching six solid innings, allowing three runs on 10 hits to beat game-loser Tsai Ming-jin of the Bulls, who entered in the sixth and managed to get only one out before serving up a pair of singles to plant the losing seed for his team.
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