An error by the Lions shortstop on a double-steal attempt by the Brother Elephants led to the only run of the evening as the Elephants defeated the Lions 1-0 at the Taipei Municipal Baseball Stadium in Tianmu for their sixth straight win.
With runners at the corners and two outs in a scoreless tie, the Elephants attempted a double-steal against Pan “Du Du” Wei-luen and his catcher Chen Jung-hu.
Although the Lions guessed correctly — with Pan throwing a pitchout to Chen on the play to give his catcher plenty of time to gun down the runner at second — the play succeeded.
PHOTO: HUANG CHIH-YUAN, TAIPEI TIMES
The showdown between Pan and Elephants starter Tsao Chin-hui saw Tsao take a three-hit shutout one out into the seventh, while Du Du lasted eight strong innings with one unearned run on five scattered singles.
“If it hadn’t been for the error that scored the run, we’d probably have gone into extra innings,” Tsao said after the game, complimenting a great outing by Du Du.
With the hard-earned lead, Elephants skipper Nakagomi Sin immediately went to setup man Matt Perisho after Tsao gave up a one-out single in the bottom of the seventh.
Perisho allowed a single to the first batter he faced to put runners on first and third with one out, but managed to get out of trouble by striking out the next hitter before inducing a grounder to short, ending the Lions scoring threat in the seventh.
The Elephants’ Mai Jia-rei then pitched a scoreless eighth and closer Ryan Cullen retired the side in order in a perfect ninth to keep the shutout intact.
Tsao picked up his eighth win of the season, allowing no runs on four hits over six-and-a-third frames to beat an unlucky Pan.
BULLS 9, BEARS 3
The Sinon Bulls won their second of a three-game series against the La New Bears in a 9-3 decision at the Kaohsiung County Baseball Stadium on Saturday evening.
Three Sinon batters had multi-hit games, led by rookie sensation Lin Yi-chuan’s 4-for-5 at the plate, with a home run and five RBIs.
Also starring was speedy outfielder Yu Hsien-ming, who batted a perfect 4-for-4 and drove in a run for the Bulls.
Inter’s defense of their Italian Serie A title was hit with a setback on Sunday as they lost 1-0 at home to AS Roma, while Scott McTominay netted a brace as SSC Napoli beat Torino 2-0 to go top of the table. No fixtures were played on Friday or Saturday because of the funeral of Pope Francis in Rome, meaning the full round of Serie A matches took place on Sunday and yesterday. Matias Soule’s first-half strike for Roma knocked Inter off top spot earlier in the day before new Napoli opened up a three-point buffer with victory in Sunday’s
Ethiopia’s Tigst Assefa yesterday set a women’s only world record of 2 hours, 15 minutes, 50 seconds as she won the London Marathon, while Kenya’s Sabastian Sawe put a star-studded men’s field to the sword. For 28-year-old Assefa it was ample compensation for finishing runner-up in London and the Paris Olympics last year — especially as bitter Dutch rival, the Ethiopia-born Sifan Hassan, finished third. Assefa dropped Kenya’s Joyciline Jepkosgei as the race, played out in blazing sunshine and with thousands lining the route, entered its business end. She came home almost three minutes clear of the Kenyan. Hassan, who beat her in
FOCUS: ‘We came out here with a goal in mind ... to keep our foot on their throat and on their neck, and continue to play 48 minutes of basketball,’ Donovan Mitchell said The Cleveland Cavaliers on Monday thrashed the Miami Heat to cruise into the next round of the NBA playoffs as the Golden State Warriors battled past the Houston Rockets 109-106 to move to the brink of a series victory. After pounding Miami 124-87 in game three on Saturday, No.1 Eastern Conference seeds Cleveland once again piled on the misery for their outclassed opponents with a crushing 138-83 victory to complete a 4-0 series win. The 55-point drubbing was the largest series-clinching victory in NBA playoff history and sets up a series against either the Indiana Pacers or Milwaukee Bucks in
Canadian actor Ryan Reynolds said it felt like an “impossible dream” when fellow Hollywood A-lister Rob McElhenney first floated the idea of buying soccer club Wrexham, along with a pitch for a documentary. The ultimate goal was reaching the Premier League. Four years after they purchased the north Wales outfit, Wrexham are one league away from achieving their lofty goal after a 3-0 win over Charlton Athletic on Saturday saw them promoted for a record third consecutive time. “We were standing there doing a press conference four years ago, and said our goal is to make it to the Premier League, and
RSS