Adam LaRoche had four hits and little brother Andy drove in a pair of runs in leading the Pittsburgh Pirates over the Florida Marlins 7-4 and a three-game sweep in the National League on Wednesday.
Florida began the series with an 11-1 record, a seven-game winning streak and a 6-0 road record, only to be outscored 18-6 while being swept in a three-game series by Pittsburgh for the first time since 2005.
Seven Pirates had at least one hit each, including starting pitcher Paul Maholm (3-0). Adam LaRoche went 4-for-5 with three doubles.
PHOTO: AP
GIANTS 1, PADRES 0, 10 INNINGS
At San Francisco, Bengie Molina’s pinch-hit double with two outs in the 10th inning drove in Andres Torres to give San Francisco the win before 26,593 people, its smallest crowd since moving into AT&T Park in 2000.
DIAMONDBACKS 2, ROCKIES 0
At Phoenix, Dan Haren pitched seven sharp innings as Ryan Roberts’ pinch-hit single broke a scoreless tie for Arizona.
Haren and Colorado’s Jorge De La Rosa (0-2) matched shutout innings until the seventh, when Chris Young singled, went to second on Chris Snyder’s single and scored on Roberts’ single.
Arizona went up 2-0 when reliever Jason Grilli issued a bases-loaded walk to Conor Jackson on a 3-2 pitch with two outs.
Also on Wednesday it was:
• Brewers 3, Phillies 1
• Braves 1, Nationals 0
• Reds 3, Cubs 0
• Astros 6, Dodgers 5
• Cardinals 5, Mets 2
Melky Cabrera ended a home run-filled opening homestand at new Yankee Stadium with a two-run drive in the 14th inning to give New York a 9-7 victory over the Oakland Athletics on Wednesday.
The Yankees overcame another shaky outing from CC Sabathia on a rainy afternoon that featured five more home runs. But after Oakland tied the score in the seventh, what had been a US$1.5 billion hitters’ haven turned into a pitchers’ park until Cabrera’s second drive of the game off Dan Giese (0-2).
Hideki Matsui and Derek Jeter also homered in the longest game of the season by innings and time (4 hours, 57 minutes).
A record 26 homers were hit on the opening homestand, one more than the previous mark for a major league venue established at Kansas City’s Municipal Stadium in 1955, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
Also on Wednesday it was:
• Royals 2, Indians 0
• White Sox 8, Orioles 2
• Red Sox 10, Twins 1,
7 innings, 1st game
• Red Sox 7, Twins 3, 2nd game
• Blue Jays 8, Rangers 7, 11 innings
• Tigers 12, Angels 10
• Rays 9, Mariners 3
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier