Scoring early and often, the EDA Rhinos roughed up the Lamigo Monkeys 8-2 at the Taoyuan International Baseball Stadium last night to take the weekend series on the road by a 2-1 margin.
Coming into the contest after an 11-4 blowout loss to the Primates the night before, which cost them the top spot in the standings, the Rhinos had only thing on their mind — win big to clinch the series.
And that was what exactly what they did as they teed off against Lamigo starter Zach Miner with three runs in the opening frame on the merit of three singles and a walk on top of a sacrifice fly.
Photo: Chen Chih-chu, Taipei Times
That was just the beginning of what turned out to be a seven-run spree for the roadsters as they plated at least one run over the next three innings, highlighted by a pair of homers off Miner to chase the Lamigo starter while jumping to a commanding 7-0 advantage.
Rhinos starter Yang Chien-fu did not disappoint his generous teammates as he held the Monkey offense scoreless over five innings of three-hit ball before turning the game over to his bullpen.
Even though the Rhinos bullpen lost the shutout bid by allowing a pair of runs in the sixth on three straight base hits off reliever Tsai Ming-chin, it did not amount to much as Huang Po-yang promptly induced three lazy flies to freeze a runner on second and dampen the Monkeys comeback attempt.
The two runs in the sixth were the only runs that the Primates could muster off the Rhinos bullpen as Huang followed his immaculate sixth with a scoreless seventh, before Lin Yi-hao and Rommie Lewis chipped in a scoreless eighth and ninth respectively to keep the Monkeys at bay.
Picking up the win was Yang, who improved to 3-0 for the season, while the loss was charged to Miner, who allowed seven runs on 10 hits over four innings of play to remain winless at 0-2 in the four starts he has had.
Rhino slugger Kao Guo-hui also stretched his home-run streak to four games with a pair of blasts to give him 14 for the year, two shy of the Monkeys’ Lin “Chubby Kid” Hung-yu’s league-best 16.
Meanwhile, the Uni-President Lions and the Chinatrust Brothers played to a 7-7 tie over 12 innings at the Tainan Municipal Baseball Stadium to end the three-game weekend with two rare ties.
The Brothers scored five unanswered runs in the eighth to erase a 2-7 deficit, which sent the game into extra sessions.
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