AMERICAN LEAGUE
Taiwanese pitcher Chen Wei-yin gave a stellar performance on Wednesday to lead the Baltimore Orioles to a 10-6 win against the Boston Red Sox and continued his most successful season since signing with the Major League Baseball team in 2012.
Chen, 29, improved his career record to 15 wins in a single season after allowing one run over seven innings as Baltimore completed a three-game sweep of Boston at Fenway Park.
Photo: USA TODAY
The outing marked Chen’s first win in the last month of the MLB regular season, something the local Chinese-language press described as breaking his “September jinx.”
In the afternoon game, Chen allowed only three hits, including a solo homer in the seventh, and struck out four.
No Red Sox batters reached first base in the first five innings.
“Chen gave the Orioles some early confidence, needing just 59 pitches to get through five perfect innings, while holding the Red Sox to one run over seven dominant innings,” MLB.com said.
Boston’s first hit came in the form of Dan Butler’s one-out double in the sixth, but the lefty allowed just two hits after that, including the lead-off homer by Xander Bogaerts in the next inning and a follow-up double by David Ortiz.
Caleb Joseph homered and drove in three runs, while Ryan Flaherty got a career-high four hits as Baltimore won for the 11th time in 14 games.
Chen managed to induce a groundout and recorded his last two strikeouts in the game to end the Red Sox offensive.
Boston’s five-run rally at the bottom of the ninth was not enough to overcome the deficit.
Darren O’Day got the last out with two runners on for his third save.
Brandon Workman (1-9) lost his ninth straight decision since winning at Baltimore on June 10.
The result maintained the Orioles’ commanding lead in the American League East and cut the number of games they need to win — now down to eight — to finish first in the division.
For Chen, this year has become his most successful MLB season since moving from Japan’s professional baseball league.
His 15th win followed his previous record of 12 wins in an MLB season, which he set in 2012.
He had only seven wins last season, when he was on the disabled list for almost two months with an injury to his right oblique.
Wang Chien-ming, a right-hander, holds the record of most wins by a Taiwanese pitcher in an MLB season. He won 19 games each in 2006 and 2007 for the New York Yankees.
With a record of 62-34 from 2005 to last year, Wang is also the Taiwanese pitcher with the best record to date in the Major League, followed by Chen (34-22).
In his career with the Chunichi Dragons in Nippon Professional Baseball from 2005 to 2011, Chen had 36 wins and 30 losses, with 13 being his highest number of wins in a single season.
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