Behind the potent hitting of a suddenly awakened attack, the Chinatrust Whales have won three straight to ascend from the bottom of the standings, hinting at a strong finish in this season’s play.
Friday night’s 6-2 win over a favored President Lions club on the road in Tainan was the latest in a trio of triumphs that began on Tuesday in a close 5-4 win over the dmedia T-Rex at Sinjhuang.
Chinatrust would beat dmedia again on Thursday evening in Hsinchu in a 7-3 decision to sweep the two-game series, thanks to a solid outing on the mound by starter Du Chang-wei and the stellar hitting of shortstop Chang Jia-yuan, who went 4-for-5 with an RBI to lead the Whales attack.
PHOTO: HUANG CHIH-YUAN
The fourth-year shortstop — who had spent the past three seasons mostly on the Lions bench prior to joining the Whales’ starting lineup this season — has shown tremendous range on the field and is in the midst of a batting binge, with an eight-game hitting streak.
Friday night’s contest was especially sweet for Chang as he teed off against his former club by going 3-for-5 with an RBI to remind the Lions of their questionable decision to let him go.
Also starring for the Whales was Wilton Veras, who batted 4-for-5 with a pair of doubles for two RBIs while improving his team-leading average to .361.
Veras’ run-scoring double off Lions ace Pan ‘Du Du’ Wei-luen in the opening inning got things moving in the right direction for the Whales before Chang and Veras added a run each during the second and third innings to lead it 3-0.
The Whales would double their lead to 6-0 in the sixth and actually had a shutout going through the eighth before surrendering a pair of runs in the ninth.
Picking up the surprising win against the league’s ERA-leading Du Du was Whales starter Chu Wei-ming, who allowed two runs on seven hits for his third win of the season. Other than the two-run homer that he served up in the bottom of the ninth, the emerging righty was magnificent.
Pan lost for only the second time this year, with four allowed runs on 10 hits over five innings of work.
Typhoon Sinlaku sidelined both contests scheduled for yesterday — between the Whales and the Lions in Tainan and the Brother Elephants and the dmedia T-Rex in Tienmu.
The T-Rex will try to make up some ground by playing a day-night doubleheader against the Elephants at the Taipei County aseball Stadium in Sinjhuang today while the La New Bears will host their doubleheader versus the Sinon Bulls at the Kaohsiung County Baseball Stadium to make up for a missed game on Friday.
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