Strong performances by starters Bronswell Patrick and Nakagomi Sin led the Brother Elephants to a pair of impressive victories over the President Lions earlier in the week as the Elephants quietly reclaimed the third-place spot in the standings.
The two wins were part of a 7-3 run on which the Elephants have gone in their past 10 contests, breathing new signs of life into the popular baseball team that had won three consecutive championships from 2001 to 2003.
"Good starting pitching is everything in this business. Without it, you will find yourself playing catch-up all the time and that won't win you many games anywhere," the Elephants' American veteran righty Jonathan Hurst said.
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE BROTHER ELEPHANTS
Hurst and his newly-arrived countryman, Patrick, have accounted for four of the seven Elephants wins during their 7-3 stretch, with Japanese starter Muto Ichiro contributing two wins as well.
Tuesday's series opener at Chiayi had the Lions drawing first blood with a couple of runs in the top of the first on an RBI groundout by cleanup man Darryl Brinkley and first baseman Kao Guo-ching's one-run single off Patrick, before the Elephants countered with eight unanswered runs for a 8-2 win.
The two early runs by the Lions would be all the scoring that they had for the night as Patrick quickly settled in and held them scoreless over the next 6-2/3 frames en route to his third victory of the year. He fanned three and walked two on 113 pitches while allowing eight scattered hits.
Offensively for the Elephants, an efficient attack that came through in nearly all the scoring opportunities managed to plate eight runs on as many hits against a Lions staff that caught no breaks whatsoever.
Elephants third baseman Wang Jin-yong and left fielder Hsu Chih-wei each knocked in a pair of runs for their club with Wang doing it via a towering two-run home run off Lions starter Chang Chih-chiang in the third inning and Hsu via a triple off the left-center wall in the eighth.
Pocketing the tough loss for the big cats was starter Chang who allowed four runs on three hits over five innings in an effort that would have warranted a win had it not been for the Elephants' usually efficient offense.
Elephants 4, Lions 3
Wang Jin-yong's walk-off homer off Lions ace closer Mike Garcia in the bottom of the ninth broke a 3-all tie to give the Elephants a 4-3 win in Taichung on Wednesday.
It was only his third long ball of the year, but the second in as many games, as the Elephants' man-of-the-hour delivered the game-winner in a close match.
Like the previous night, the Lions struck first in the opening inning on Darryl Brinkley's two-run double off Nakagomi Sin for a quick 2-0 cushion. And as before, the Elephants would answer with a three-run third on the strength of two run-scoring doubles and an RBI single off Lions starter John Mangieri to claim a 3-2 advantage.
The score remained 3-2 in favor of the Elephants until the top of the sixth when Lions designated hitter Lin Hong-yuan smashed a belt-high strike from Sin for a solo homer to straight-away center, knotting the game up at 3-all to set the stage for Wang's late-inning heroics.
Elephants rookie closer Wu Bao-shien tossed a scoreless ninth for his fifth win of the year, while his counterpart Garcia picked up the loss for surrendering the game-deciding home run, his first since last July.
Upcoming games
The Elephants will finish off their four-game set against the Lions this week with tonight's contest at Hsinchuang before meeting for their series finale at Tienmu tomorrow afternoon. Hurst will have a chance to take on his old friend Doug Linton (Lions) as the two former major leaguers do battle in the fight for third place in the standings.
Also in action this week are the Sinon Bulls in a three-game visit to the La New Bears at Kaohsiung starting with last night's game before tonight and Sunday's contests.
The league-leading Macoto Cobras will take on the Chinatrust Whales in their three-game series at Hsinchuang with last night's all-important Game 1 before doing it again over the weekend with two games scheduled for tomorrow and Sunday.
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