Miscues on the part of the Lamigo Monkeys defense led to a pair of unearned runs for the Uni-President Lions and that was all it took for the home Cats to defeat the visiting Primates in a 4-3 final at the Tainan Municipal Baseball Stadium last night.
The win not only stretched the Lions’ home-win streak to nine in a row, but also clinched the weekend series for them as they edged past the Monkeys by a run for the second straight night, following Friday night’s 3-2 loss to deny Lamigo what could have been a pair of probable victories.
Huang Hao-ran’s passed ball with runners on second and third and two outs scored the second of two runs for the Lions in the bottom of the first, before a wild pitch by Matt DeSalvo, after an error by the Lamigo shortstop had advanced the runner to third on the previous play, made it 3-0 in favor of the Lions over the first two innings of play.
Trailing by three, the Primates finally got on the board in the top of the fourth on the strength of Tseng Hao-jui’s two-run double off Lions starter Ryan Edell, only to see DeSalvo serve up a bases-loaded walk in the bottom of the same inning to keep it a two-run game.
The run by the Lions proved critical, as the Monkeys managed to shorten the gap once again in the seventh with a solo blast by Yeh Chu-hsuan off reliever Kao Jien-san.
However, that was as close as they got as the Lions buckled down in the eighth, despite allowing a runner to reach third before closer Wang Jing-ming struck out the side in the ninth to preserve the narrow win.
Edell was credited with his third win in as many starts since joining the Lions late last month. The American southpaw allowed two runs on five hits over six effective innings of work.
Taking the loss was his counterpart and fellow countryman DeSalvo, who pitched well enough to win, but fell victim to a pair of unearned runs over 4-1/3 frames to settle with a 5-4 record for the year.
Elephants 16, Bulls 6
Eleven runs over the last three innings of play blew an otherwise close game wide open as the Brother Elephants humbled the Sinon Bulls 16-6 at the Taichung Intercontinental Baseball Stadium last night to deal the home Bulls their second straight defeat.
Homers by Peng “Chia Chia” Cheng-min and Chen Jiang-ho led a 17-hit attack for the men in the golden uniforms as they roughed up the Sinon pitching with the long ball to put the game away in the seventh and ninth respectively.
That made a winner out of starter Tseng Song-wei, who won for the second time since coming off the disabled list in late-June, allowing four runs on 10 hits over 5-2/3 innings to beat the Bulls’ Lin Chi-wei, who surrendered four in only 1-1/3 innings in his 10th loss of the year.
Shohei Ohtani and his wife arrived in South Korea with his Los Angeles Dodgers teammates yesterday ahead of their season-opening games with the San Diego Padres next week. Ohtani, wearing a black training suit and a cap backwards, was the first Dodgers player who showed up at the arrival gate of Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul. His wife, Mamiko Tanaka, walked several steps behind him. As a crowd of fans, many wearing Dodgers jerseys, shouted his name and cheered slogans, Ohtani briefly waved his hand, but did not say anything before he entered a limousine bus with his wife. Fans held placards
Taiwan’s Tai Tzu-ying yesterday advanced to the quarter-finals at the All England Open, beating Kim Ga-eun of South Korea 21-17, 21-15. With the win, Tai earned a semi-final against China’s He Bingjiao, who beat Michelle Li of Canada 21-9, 21-9. Defending champion An Se-young defeated India’s P.V. Sindhu 21-19, 21-11. An on Wednesday cruised into the second round, unlike last year’s men’s winner, Li Shifeng, who suffered a shock defeat. South Korea’s An, the world No. 1, overcame Taiwan’s Hsu Wen-chi 21-17, 21-16 to set up the match against Sindhu. In other women’s singles matches, Taiwan’s Sung Shuo-yun lost 21-18, 24-22 against Carolina Marin of
EYEING TOP SPOT: A victory in today’s final against Storm Hunter and Katerina Siniakova would return 38-year-old Hsieh Su-wei to the world No. 1 ranking Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Mertens on Thursday secured a spot in the women’s doubles finals at the BNP Paribas Open after dispatching Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the US and Australia’s Ellen Perez 6-2, 7-6 (7/5) at Indian Wells. Hsieh and her Belgian partner Mertens, who won the Australian Open in late January, coasted through the first set after breaking their opponents’ serve twice, but found the going tougher in the second. Both pairs could only muster one break point over 12 games, neither of which were converted, leaving the set to be decided by a tiebreaker. Hsieh and Mertens took a 6-3 lead,
DOUBLES PAYBACK: Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Martens avenged their defeat in the quarters at the Qatar TotalEnergies Open against Demi Schuurs and Luisa Stefani Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei on Wednesday advanced to the semi-finals of the women’s doubles at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, California. Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium dispatched Demi Schuurs and Luisa Stefani 6-1, 6-4 to set up a clash against Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the US and Australia’s Ellen Perez for a spot in the final of the WTA 1000 tournament. Hsieh and Martens made a blistering start to their rematch after they lost to Schuurs and Stefani in the quarter-finals at the Qatar TotalEnergies Open last month, winning three games without reply at the start of the first set