Continuing their mastery over the opposition, the Brother Elephants doubled up on the Sinon Bulls by a 4-2 margin at the Taichung Municipal Baseball Stadium on Thursday to sweep their two-game series.
It was their fourth straight victory and seventh in the past eight. They are now in an all-out effort to contend for the second-half title as they trail the top-ranked La New Bears and the Uni-President Lions (tied for first) by just one game in the standings.
Leading the way with yet another fine performance on the mound was Elephants starter Tseng Jia-min, who allowed a run on three hits over six-and-two-third effective innings of play to win his sixth of the season. Other than a few control problems from time to time, with five walks issued, Tseng managed to take a 4-0 shutout into the seventh, before giving up a run to lose the shutout bid.
PHOTO: CHAN CHAO-YANG, TAIPEI TIMES
Offensively for the men in the golden uniforms, Chen “Golden Warrior” Chih-yuan batted a solid two-for-four, with a home run and two RBIs in his fourth straight multi-hit outing.
LIONS 5, T-REX 4
Kuo Jung-yo’s two-run double capped a four-run fifth that broke open a 1-1 tie for the Uni-President Lions and they held on to defeat the dmedia T-Rex 5-4 at the Tainan Municipal Baseball Stadium on Thursday night.
The win propelled the home Cats to a tie for first with the idle Bears, who saw their half-game lead erased as the race for the elusive second-half title heightened, with a lone game separating the top three clubs in the league.
Picking up the win in his first career start was Lions lefty Pan Jung-rong, who surrendered a run on five hits over five-and-two-third innings of work to beat his counterpart and former teammate Chiang Bo-ching, who cruised through the first four innings before running into a world of trouble in a dreadful fifth that cost T-Rex the game.
Boston Red Sox pitcher Connelly Early on Tuesday struck out 11 in five shutout innings to match a franchise record during his MLB debut against the Oakland Athletics. “Pretty sick performance,” teammate Romy Gonzalez said. “It was fun to watch.” The only other Red Sox starter to rack up 11 strikeouts in his first career game was Don Aase versus the Milwaukee Brewers on July 26, 1977. “It was amazing, just to go out there and have that first opportunity,” Early said after getting the win in a 6-0 victory. “A long day of travel yesterday and just getting to the field, seeing
‘DEVASTATED’: Argentina’s win was a reversal of their 28-24 defeat last week, with Australian forward Fraser McReight adding that ‘we did the same thing last week’ Argentina flyhalf Santiago Carreras punished an undisciplined Australia with 23 points off the tee as the Pumas held on grimly for a 28-26 win in Sydney yesterday to breathe new life into their Rugby Championship campaign. A try-fest beckoned in afternoon sunshine at Sydney Football Stadium, but Argentina needed only one through captain Julian Montoya, with Carreras doing the damage with seven penalties and a conversion in front of a sell-out crowd. A week after letting a 14-point lead slip in a 28-24 defeat to Australia in Townsville, Argentina saw most of a 21-point advantage erased in the final quarter as the
ELEVEN STRIKEOUTS: Blake Snell allowed two singles and two walks against the Rockies as he ended a personal three-game skid with his first win since Aug. 16 Blake Snell on Wednesday struck out a season-high 11 in six innings, while Mookie Betts hit a grand slam in the eighth as the Los Angeles Dodgers defeated the Colorado Rockies 9-0 for their fourth straight win. Helped by their third series sweep of the Rockies this MLB season, the Dodgers increased their National League West lead to three games over the San Diego Padres, who lost 2-1 at home to the Cincinnati Reds. Betts went four for five with five RBIs, capped by his seventh career slam on a 3-0 pitch from reliever Anthony Molina to make it 8-0. Andy Pages and
Captain Vijay Kumar led the way yesterday as the Hsinchu Titans claimed the Taiwan Premier League title at the Yingfeng Cricket Ground in Taipei’s Songshan District (松山), beating PCCT by 27 runs. The weather was a topic again, but not the rain that played a role in previous matches in the often-delayed tournament. Kumar, who made 80 not out from 63 deliveries, and teammate Vishwajit Kumar (58 from 43) rescued the Titans from a precarious state at the end of the power play in the T20 match. The visitors were put in to bat and struggled to 26-3 as PCCT