Chang Jia-hao’s two-run single to the opposite field with two outs capped a four-run third inning as the La New Bears held off a late rally by the Brother Elephants to win 6-5 at the Douliou County Baseball Stadium yesterday afternoon in the day game of a doubleheader.
The veteran utility man, better known for his fielding and glove work, came up big with the bat, slapping a shot to shallow-left in the bottom of the third that gave his club a 6-1 lead.
The Elephants put up two runs in the fourth with back-to-back RBI singles from Chen Jiang-ho and Chen Guan-ren to make it 6-3 and they threatened again in the top of the ninth with a pair of runs off Bears closer Hsu Ming-jeh on the strength of Chen Chih-hong’s two-run double.
PHOTO: LIAO YAO-TUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
That was as close as they got as Tseng Jau-hao calmly struck out the final batter with the tying run in scoring position to preserve the win for starter Ken Ray.
Taking the loss was Elephants right-hander Jim Magrane, who started the rain-suspended game the night before and was forced to watch the rest from the dugout to suffer his sixth defeat of the year.
ELEPHANTS 6, BEARS 4
On the verge of being swept by the Bears in their weekend series, the Elephants overcame a one-run deficit in the seventh inning by scoring the game’s final three runs to trip up the Bears 6-4 in the night game.
The Bears held three different leads on the night, but failed to make good on any of them as they allowed the Elephants to come back on each occasion, with homers from Peng “Chia Chia” Cheng-min and Wang Sheng-wei costing them dearly.
It was Wang’s solo blast off Bears starter Luis Villarreal that tied the game at 4-4 in the seventh, before the men in the golden uniforms went ahead for good in the eighth with two runs to deny the Bears a clean sweep.
Reliever Yeh Yong-jeh was credited with the win for his one-and-two-third innings of scoreless work, while ace closer Ryan Cullen pitched a perfect eighth and ninth to register his league-best 25th save of the year.
Geng Bo-hsuan was charged with the loss for allowing the go-ahead run in the eighth as he fell to the 3-5 mark for the year.
LIONS 3, BULLS 1
The Uni-President Lions also avoided being swept by the Sinon Bulls by topping their nemeses from Taichung 3-1 at the Taipei County Baseball Stadium last night.
Starter Wang Jing-ming tossed almost seven innings of shutout ball, despite giving up seven hits in the process to beat his counterpart Lin Ying-jeh, who pitched well enough for the win, but fell short because of a lack of run support from his offense.
Offensively for the Cats, Kuo Dai-chi’s solo homer off Lin in the third led an extremely efficient attack that scored three times on the six hits it managed off the Bulls pitching in a game in which the Bulls actually outhit the Lions 11 to 6.
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