Wang Jung-tai’s two-out single with runners on second and third broke a 2-2 tie to lift the Brother Elephants past the Sinon Bulls 5-3 on Sunday for a sweep of the three-game weekend series at Taipei Municipal Baseball Stadium in Tianmu.
The second-year catcher from National Chiayi University made skipper Nakagomi Sin look like a genius. Sin sent in a speedier Wang to pinch run for Kuo Yi-fong in a scoreless tie after the veteran catcher had doubled off Sinon starter Lin Ying-jeh with two outs in the bottom of the fifth.
Wang not only ran back the Elephants’ first run of the game on the ensuing single by Chen Jiang-heh, but topped it with a clutch two-run single of his own in what ended up being a three-run sixth to give his team a 4-2 lead. The Elephants maintained a two-point lead for the rest of the game.
Also starring for the men in the golden uniform was Chen Guan-ren, who went 2-for-4 with a pair of RBIs to extend his hitting streak to six straight. The veteran slugger has had at least one hit in all but two of the 10 games he has played since rejoining the team in the middle of last month after suffering a broken arm in the first week of the season that had sidelined him for nearly four months.
Starter Liao “the Golden Submarine” Yu-cheng was credited with the win for allowing three runs on five hits and four walks over six innings to beat his counterpart Lin, who lasted through the fifth with two allowed runs but fell victim to a lack of run support.
LIONS 1, BEARS 0
Kuo Dai-chi’s RBI double in the bottom of the eighth proved decisive as the Uni-President Lions blanked the La New Bears at the Taipei County Baseball Stadium in Sinjhuang on Sunday to sweep their weekend series against their arch-rivals.
Neither offense was able to plate a run through the seventh against the solid pitching of starters Pan “Du Du” Wei-luen (Lions) and Hsu Wen-hsiung (Bears) as the highly anticipated pitchers’ duel lived up to its billing.
It took a leadoff walk issued by Bears reliever Tseng Jau-hao to put a Lions runner on first in the bottom of the eighth and set the stage for Kuo’s game-winning swing.
The hapless Bears, who lost eight in a row to tie the team mark for longest losing skid this year, managed to put a runner on in the top of the ninth against Lions closer Lin Yueh-ping when Tseng Hao-jui singled for the tying run. That was as close as they got as Huang Long-yi grounded to short for the game-ending out.
Tainan TSG Hawks slugger Steven Moya, who is leading the CPBL in home runs, has withdrawn from this weekend’s All-Star Game after the unexpected death of his wife. Moya’s wife began feeling severely unwell aboard a plane that landed at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on Friday evening. She was rushed to a hospital, but passed away, the Hawks said in a statement yesterday. The franchise is assisting Moya with funeral arrangements and hopes fans who were looking forward to seeing him at the All-Star Game can understand his decision to withdraw. According to Landseed Medical Clinic, whose staff attempted to save Moya’s wife,
Wallabies coach Joe Schmidt yesterday backed Nick Champion de Crespigny to be the team’s “roving scavenger” after handing him a shock debut in the opening Test against the British and Irish Lions Test in Brisbane. Hard man Champion de Crespigny, who spent three seasons at French side Castres before moving to the Western Force this year, is to get his chance tomorrow with first-choice blindside flanker Rob Valetini not fully fit. His elevation is an eye-opener, preferred to Tom Hooper, but Schmidt said he had no doubt about his abilities. “I keep an eye on the Top 14 having coached there many years
ON A KNEE: In the MLB’s equivalent of soccer’s penalty-kicks shoot-out, the game was decided by three batters from each side taking three swings each off coaches Kyle Schwarber was nervous. He had played in Game 7 of the MLB World Series and homered for the US in the World Baseball Classic (WBC), but he had never walked up to the plate in an All-Star Game swing-off. No one had. “That’s kind of like the baseball version of a shoot-out,” Schwarber said after homering on all three of his swings, going down to his left knee on the final one, to overcome a two-homer deficit. That held up when Jonathan Aranda fell short on the American League’s final three swings, giving the National League a 4-3 swing-off win after
Seattle’s Cal Raleigh defeated Tampa Bay’s Junior Caminero 18-15 in Monday’s final to become the first catcher to win the Major League Baseball Home Run Derby. The 28-year-old switch-hitter, who leads MLB with 38 homers this season, won US$1 million by capturing the special event for sluggers at Atlanta’s Truist Park ahead of yesterday’s MLB All-Star Game. “It means the world,” Raleigh said. “I could have hit zero home runs and had just as much fun. I just can’t believe I won. It’s unbelievable.” Raleigh, who advanced from the first round by less than 25mm on a longest homer tiebreaker, had his father
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