Sinon Bulls kept their first-half title hunt alive with back-to-back wins over the La New Bears last weekend in Kaohsiung. Down by three-and-a-half games, the Bulls can still win the title with four straight victories this week: A makeup game against the Elephants at home in Taichung yesterday and a three-game sweep of the league-leading President Lions later in the week.
After dropping their series opener against the Bears in an 11-2 slaughter on Thursday, the Bulls bounced back and beat the Bears convincingly by a 9-4 final on Saturday, before Sunday night's 3-0 shutout.
Four hits in the top of the first, capped by designated hitter Chen Tsung-fu's (陳宗甫) two-run single, gave the Bulls an early 4-0 lead in Saturday's contest. Starter Yu Wen-bin nearly blew the lead by allowing three Bear runs in the next two innings to keep the game close. The Bulls would add to their 4-3 lead in the sixth with catcher Shih Jau-tung's (施昭同) just-fair liner that brought home both runners before putting the game away in the eighth on another RBI single by Shih and leftfielder Kao Jien-lung (高健龍).
Yu Wen-bin earned his first win of the year by allowing four runs (one earned) on seven hits in 5-1/3 innings of work, thanks to 3-2/3 innings of shutout relief by set-up man Ho Chi-shien (何紀賢) and closer Osvaldo Martinez.
Short stop Cheng Jau-hang's (鄭兆行) solo blast off the left foul pole gave the Bulls the lead for good in Sunday's series finale. Starter Kuo Yung-chih (郭勇志) surrendered only three hits in 6-1/3 scoreless frames before Martinez finished off strong in one-hitting the Bears over the final 2-2/3 innings of play.
Bear starter Iriki Satoshi fell victim to no-run support in the rough loss, even though his three-run, nine-hit outing would have won the game with a reasonable run support from his offense.
Playing in their league-leading form, the Lions forced a 2-2 tie in their four-game series against the Macoto Cobras by winning Games 3 and 4 over the weekend.
Cobra lefty ace Lin Ying-jeh (林英傑) could not overcome the three early runs he allowed (all of which were unearned) as a result of a costly throwing error by third baseman Deng Shih-yang (鄧蒔陽) in the Lions' 5-3 triumph. Lin did manage to fan eight Lion batters over seven frustrating innings in the losing effort to break the century mark for most strikeouts in a half-season by a local pitcher. The previous mark of 97, held by Huang Ping-yang (黃平洋) of the former Weichuan Dragons in 1993 had stood for 11 years. Lin's 105 K's with a scheduled start left has him eying the all-time league mark of 119 set by Enrique Burgos of the Lions in 1990.
Picking up where they left off, the Lions cruised to a 7-2 fifth inning lead en route to Sunday's 13-3 trouncing of the hapless serpents. Starter Pan Wei-luen (
Offensively for the big cats, rookie first baseman Kao Kuo-ching's (
The Elephants' road to the first-half title took two undesirable turns as they lost two in a row to the Chinatrust Whales to fall two games behind the Lions.
Relief pitching continued to haunt the defending champs in the 8-5 loss as Wang Jing-li (
Starter Kao Jien-san (
SSC Napoli’s Italian Serie A title hopes suffered a late setback on Sunday when they were held to a 2-2 draw at home against Genoa, setting up a thrilling season finale with closest rivals Inter just one point behind. The hosts remain top with 78 points, holding a slim lead over Inter, who won 2-0 at Torino earlier on Sunday, with two rounds remaining. To make matters worse for Napoli, midfielder Stanislav Lobotka, struggling with an ankle injury, was forced off just minutes after the match began. Scott McTominay delivered a perfect pass into the box where Romelu Lukaku got
Harry Kane opened the scoring ahead of lifting his first career silverware as Bayern Munich beat Borussia Moenchengladbach 2-0, with veteran Thomas Mueller playing his last home game for the club. Bayern officially won the title on May 4 when defending champions Bayer Leverkusen were held to a 2-2 draw at Freiburg, but were presented with the Bundesliga shield in front of their home fans at full-time. Dripping wet after being showered with beer by teammates, Kane said the title win was “an incredible feeling,” and hoped it would be “the first of many.” “It’s been lot of hard work, a lot of
A stunning Lamine Yamal strike on Thursday helped crown Barcelona La Liga champions with a 2-0 win over local rivals RCD Espanyol, with victory ensuring Real Madrid cannot catch them at the top of the table. Yamal’s effort and Fermin Lopez’s goal took Hansi Flick’s side seven points clear of Los Blancos with two matches remaining, to clinch Barcelona’s 28th title and complete a superb domestic treble. Only the UEFA Champions League title escaped an exciting young Barca side this season, as they won the league for the second time in six years, at Espanyol’s ground again just as in 2022-2023. Back then,
Jannik Sinner on Thursday marched into the semi-finals of the Italian Open after destroying Casper Ruud in straight sets 6-0, 6-1, while Coco Gauff won a marathon three-set battle with China’s Zheng Qinwen to advance to the women’s singles final. American Gauff is to face Italy’s Jasmine Paolini in today’s title match after pulling through 7-6 (7/3), 4-6, 7-6 (7/4) in a match that lasted over three-and-a-half hours. Ruud was supposed to be Sinner’s toughest test in Rome since he came back from his three-month doping ban, as the Norwegian came into the match in hot form on clay after winning in
RSS