The La New Bears clinched a berth in the upcoming Taiwan Series with a 4-2 home victory against the Sinon Bulls in Kaohsiung on Monday night, taking a giant step toward their quest for their first-ever league title.
With a 27-9-3 record in the second half (with eleven games left in the regular season) and an overall season mark of 57-28-4, 12 games ahead of the next-best club (Bulls), the first-half champs will skip the best-of-five, first round action between the No. 2 and No. 3 team in the league and claim home-field advantage in the annual Fall Classic.
As the continuation of a rain-suspended game from Aug. 5th, Monday night's contest began in the top of the fifth inning with the Bulls clinging to a 2-0 lead, before the home Bears evened things up in the bottom of the sixth on a two-run single by second baseman Lu Jung-hsiung off Sinon right-hander Takekiyo Kouji of Japan.
PHOTO: CHANG CHUNG-YI, TAIPEI TIMES
The 2-2 tie lasted until the bottom of the eighth when outfielder Tseng Hao-jui's two-out double to deep-right off Bulls reliever Alfredo Gonzalez dropped just in time to score both runners to give his team a 4-2 lead.
And that was how it ended as Bears closer Ramon Morel pitched a scoreless ninth, despite allowing a single to Huang Chung-yi, to preserve the win.
Bears righty Hsu Wen-hsiung was credited with his first win in over a year for tossing four innings of shutout ball on four singles against the Bulls lineup, beating Takekiyo for his first loss of the season.
Bulls 2, Bears 0
Cheng Jau-hang's two-out single with men on second and third scored a pair of runs in the top of the fifth for the Bulls as they held on to shutout the Bears on the road to claim a 2-0 win over the league leaders, ending their recent seven-game slide.
The game-winning hit came off Bears 16-game winner Kenny Rayborn and denied the American righty a chance for his 17th win of the season, even though the Bears ace allowed only three hits over five innings in an effort worthy of a victory.
But that was not the case as Rayborn's counterpart Billy Sylvester also threw brilliantly over six scoreless frames on three hits before fellow bullpen mates Yu Wen-pin and Kuo Yong-chih combined for three innings of sound relief to keep the shutout intact.
The win by the Bulls, coupled with a President Lions loss to the Chinatrust Whales on Monday upped the Bulls' lead over the Lions in the race for a second-place finish to a full game with around ten games remaining in the season for both teams.
Whales 10, Lions 7
Four different Lions hurlers combined for a record-setting 19 strikeouts in Monday night's makeup game against the Chinatrust Whales at Tainan, but that did not prevent the Whales from escaping with a 10-7 win and last laugh.
Topping the previous high of 17 strikeouts, the Lions pitching staff managed to fool the Whales hitters when it came to fanning them, retiring at least two in seven of the nine innings during the contest.
But that was not nearly enough to compensate for the two big innings by the Whales that accounted for nine of their 10 runs in the game; a five-run first and a four-run fourth.
Lions starter snapped a seven-game winning streak with his second loss of the year, allowing nine runs (eight earned) and 10 hits over four-plus innings while striking out nine.
As for the marine mammals, American lefty Derrick Van Dusen finally earned his first win of the year with five innings of four-run ball (on six hits) to improve to a 1-3 for the year.
Elephants 7, Cobras 1
Scoring early and often against the Macoto Cobras, the Brother Elephants cruised to an easy 7-1 win over in Douliou on Tuesday night, ending Macoto staff ace Lin "Little Chick" En-yu's night after three long innings in his shortest outing of the year.
Lin had averaged over 7-1/3 innings per game in his 25 previous starts this year, never pitching fewer than six innings in each start prior to being chased off after only three on Tuesday.
Three extra-base hits (five total) off the Chick by the Elephants lineup, highlighted by Peng "Chia Chia" Cheng-min's two-run blast over the leftfield fence, plated four quick runs for the home Elephants in the bottom of the first to set the tone for the visitors early in the game before they made it 6-0 with a run in the third and fourth.
The 6-0 lead proved more than ample for Elephants starter Eddy Candelario as the Dominican veteran limited the Cobras to a lone run on six hits over seven solid innings for his third consecutive win.
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