Romulo Sanchez pitched seven innings of shutout ball, while Peng “Chia Chia” Cheng-min drove in three runs with a towering blast in the bottom of the first as the Chinatrust Brothers blanked the Lamigo Monkeys 3-0 at the Taipei Tianmu Baseball Stadium last night to take the weekend series.
Fresh off an 8-5 win over the Primates at the Sinjhuang Baseball Stadium in New Taipei City the night before to start the weekend on a high note, the Brothers needed to win last night’s contest to overtake the top-ranked EDA Rhinos, winners of four of their past five heading into their game last night, to take the lead in the standings.
And that was exactly what the men in the golden uniforms got as Sanchez took a perfect game two outs into the fourth, before giving up a single to the Monkeys’ Lin Chih-sheng in the inning.
With the weight off his shoulders, the Venezuelan righty cruised through the seventh by allowing only two more hits and one more runner to reach second in one of his best outings of the season to lift his team over their foes.
Offensively for the Brothers, Chia Chia’s first-inning blast off Monkeys starter Tseng Jau-hao proved to be the difference as the latter quickly regained his composure by silencing the Brothers offense through the sixth without further damage to keep his team in the game.
Picking up his first win of the season was Sanchez, while the loss by Tseng was his sixth of the year. He is now 1-6 in 12 starts with an ERA of 4.01.
Lions 15, Rhinos 5
The Uni-President Lions roughed up the EDA Rhinos 15-5 at the Tainan Municipal Baseball Stadium last night to ruin the Rhinos’ visit to Greater Tainan.
Five quick runs over the first two frames by the Rhinos’ offense, highlighted by Kao Guo-hui’s three-run home run off Liao Wen-yang, had many Lions fans booing their normally dependable starter, despite his team-best 9-4 record.
The five early runs turned out to be the only runs that Liao would surrender before he was pulled after the sixth with a commanding 13-5 lead after four consecutive shutout innings from the third on.
Doing the damage at the plate for the Cats were Chang “OEO” Tai-shan and Chou Guan-sheng, who drove in seven runs on a combined 6-for-9 effort to humiliate the EDA pitching.
Liao was awarded his 10th win of the year with a prompt recovery from a dismal start, allowing five runs (two earned) on as many hits over six innings of work to beat EDA reliever Lin Chen-hua, who gave up two runs on a pair of hits in the decisive fourth to remain winless at 0-7 for the year.
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