A one-run loss to the Lamigo Monkeys last weekend followed by Wednesday night’s defeat by the EDA Rhinos mean the top-ranked Brother Elephants are now on a three-game losing skid.
What had been a four-game lead over the second-placed Monkeys as recently as a week ago has dwindled to a slim one-game cushion for the men in yellow after they dropped three straight “winnable” matches because of a lack of timely hitting.
In two of the three defeats, the Elephants’ offense actually outhit their opponents by a 22-18 margin, but only had five combined runs on the scoreboard to show for it.
“[The Elephants] are getting the hits on offense, just not scoring too many runs with those hits,” renowned baseball commentator Yang Ching-lung said earlier this week.
The Elephants’ tendency to strand runners could mean trouble for them if the race to the second-half title heats up, which seems likely.
While shuffling the batting order may be one way to help improve his team’s scoring efficiency, the real issue for skipper Hsieh Chang-hen lies in the Elephants’ timidness at the plate. His hitters have been showing a distinct lack of confidence during clutch situations in recent games.
OLD HANDS
This is the perfect time for old hands such as Peng “Chia Chia” Cheng-min to demonstrate their leadership, as Hsieh is in only his first full season with the club and may not have had the chance to bond with the players as much as he would have liked.
Chia Chia is the ideal individual for this task, not only because of his tremendous accomplishments on the field over the years, but also thanks to his impeccable history off the field as an exemplary role model.
The Elephants could also use some assistance in the bullpen in the late innings, with setup man Guan Da-yuan and closer Brad Thomas eating up more innings than they would like due to a lack of depth in the squad.
WEEKEND PREVIEW
The Elephants hit the road this weekend with potentially tough encounters against the Uni-President Lions at the Taichung Intercontinental Baseball Stadium before the weekend finale at the Douliou County Baseball Stadium on Sunday.
INTERNAL TURMOIL
It will be a golden opportunity for the Elephants to try to open a gap on the Lamigo Monkey in the standings as they take on a Lions squad that has suffered some internal turmoil with interim manager Chen Lien-hung at the helm for less than a week after replacing the demoted Terushi Nakashima.
TO THE TOP: After securing the international title on Saturday, Team Taiwan were to face Las Vegas to potentially win their 18th Little League World Series championship A team from Taipei’s Dong Yuan Elementary School won the Little League Baseball World Series’ international title on Saturday by defeating Aruba 1-0 in the annual baseball tournament held in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania. The Taiwan team, competing under the name Chinese Taipei, were after press time last night to face a team from Las Vegas, Nevada, which beat a team from Fairfield, Connecticut, in the US championship 8-2. Taiwan are seeking to win their first Little League Baseball World Series title since 1996. “Really haven’t taken a moment to data dump right now on Taiwan,” Nevada manager T.J. Fescher said. “They’re a
Marc Marquez continued his winning streak as he cruised to victory in the Hungarian GP sprint by two seconds on Saturday night to pad his championship lead. It was a seventh straight Sprint victory for the Spaniard, who has also won the last six longer Sunday grand prix races on his factory Ducati. Fabio Di Giannantonio, an Italian with the VR46 Ducati satellite team was a distant second at Balaton Park, followed by his team-mate and compatriot Franco Morbidelli third. Marquez, a six-time world champion, started the race from pole position. “I felt someone really close on the first corner, from there I
Former European champions Celtic exited the UEFA Champions League in the qualifiers after a 3-2 penalty shoot-out defeat at Kazakhstan’s Kairat Almaty on Tuesday, following two goalless legs in the playoff tie. Kairat are to compete in the competition proper for the first time, while Norway’s Bodo/Glimt and Cyprus’s Pafos also secured debut appearances after coming through the playoffs. Celtic’s night ended in disappointment as they missed three penalties in the shoot-out, Daizen Maeda failing with the decisive spot-kick. The slugfest of a match went into extra-time with neither side finding the net and few overall chances, echoing the first
Russian Diana Shnaider continued her impressive winning streak in tour-level finals at the Monterrey Open on Saturday, beating compatriot Ekaterina Alexandrova 6-4, 4-6, 6-4 in the WTA 500 event’s final. Shnaider had little trouble in the opening set but struggled in a topsy-turvy second, as Alexandrova clinched the set’s fifth and decisive break at 5-4 to force a decider. Third-seed Shnaider carved out an advantage early on in the third set when she broke Alexandrova in the first game and held serve to go 2-0 up, an advantage she would not relinquish. World No. 12 Shnaider is now unbeaten in her last five