The Brother Elephants opened their 2008 season with an impressive performance as they tamed the President Lions in an 8-0 shutout at the Taipei County Baseball Stadium in Sinjhuang on Wednesday evening.
Starter Liao Yu-cheng tossed a two-hit gem with 11 strikeouts in his first career complete-game shutout win, while fellow sluggers Chen "Golden Warrior" Chih-yuan and Chen Guan-ren knocked in three runs on a combined 3-for-7 to lead the men in their familiar golden uniform in a rambunctious start.
The visiting Elephants needed only three at-bats to break the ice as the "Golden Warrior" ripped a lining single up the middle off Lions starter Chang Chih-chiang to score Huang Cheng-wei, who led off the game with a walk and reached second to score a fielder's choice.
PHOTO: WANG YI-SUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
Two of the next three Elephants hitters also connected with base hits off Chang to quickly make it 4-0 in favor of the Elephants.
After Brother added another run in the top of the second on an RBI-groundout by Chen Guan-ren to help his team lead it 5-0, the game suddenly turned into a pitchers' duel over the next six innings as neither offense was able to solve Liao and Chang until the top of the ninth with the Elephants mustering three consecutive two-out singles off Lions reliever Tsao Jung-yang to make it 8-0.
The Lions were not totally out of the game in this one, as they managed to have runners in scoring position in three different innings with Liao issuing six walks on the night. But none of the runners were able to reach home, as Liao would promptly come through with clutch strikeouts or induce timely grounders to allow the Elephants defense to turn a pair of double plays to keep the shutout intact.
Suffering the loss on the Lions' behalf was Chang, who did not pitch as poorly as the final score would indicate. Two of his five allowed runs over seven-plus innings were unearned owing to two defensive errors.
Bears 6, T-Rex 4
A pair of costly errors by the dmedia T-Rex defense that led to four unanswered runs for the La New Bears in the bottom of the eighth turned a 2-4 deficit into a 6-4 win for the Bears in Kaohsiung on Wednesday night.
Failure to cover second by T-Rex second baseman Huang Shih-hao on a routine grounder to short, all with two outs, triggered a series of bad throws by the dmedia defense ultimately scored the tying runs for the home Bears before they went ahead with two more in the same inning to lead it 6-4.
That was all Bears closer Tsai Ying-fong needed to pick up his first save of the year with a scoreless ninth to preserve the win for fellow bullpen mate Lee Fong-hua, who one-hit the T-Rex over four scoreless innings of sound relief.
Offensively for the victorious Bears, five different hitters collected multi-hit games, with team captain Huang "Easy" Long-yi leading the pack with three and an RBI.
Tagged with the loss in a game dmedia should have won was reliever Chen Jien-fu, who allowed all four of the Bears runs in the decisive eighth (only one earned) for his first defeat of the season.
Shohei Ohtani and Clayton Kershaw on Friday joined their Los Angeles Dodgers teammates in sticking their fists out to show off their glittering World Series rings at a ceremony. “There’s just a lot of excitement, probably more than I can ever recall with the Dodger fan base and our players,” manager Dave Roberts said before Los Angeles rallied to beat the Detroit Tigers 8-5 in 10 innings. “What a way to cap off the first two days of celebrations,” Roberts said afterward. “By far the best opening week I’ve ever experienced. I just couldn’t have scripted it any better.” A choir in the
The famously raucous Hong Kong Sevens are to start today in a big test for a shiny new stadium at the heart of a major US$3.85 billion sports park in the territory. Officials are keeping their fingers crossed that the premier event in Hong Kong’s sporting and social calendar goes off without a hitch at the 50,000-seat Kai Tak Stadium. They hope to entice major European soccer teams to visit in the next few months, with reports in December last year saying that Liverpool were in talks about a pre-season tour. Coldplay are to perform there next month, all part of Hong Kong’s
Shohei Ohtani, Teoscar Hernandez and Tommy Edman on Thursday smashed home runs to give the reigning World Series champions the Los Angeles Dodgers a 5-4 victory over Detroit on the MLB’s opening day in the US. The Dodgers, who won two season-opening games in Tokyo last week, raised their championship banner on a day when 28 clubs launched the season in the US. Dodgers manager Dave Roberts shuffled his batting lineup with all four leadoff hitters finally healthy as Ohtani was followed by Mookie Betts, then Hernandez and Freddie Freeman in the cleanup spot, switching places with Hernandez. “There’s a Teoscar tax to
Matvei Michkov did not score on Monday, but the Philadelphia rookie had a hand in both goals as hosts the Flyers earned a 2-1 victory over the Nashville Predators. Ryan Poehling and Jamie Drysdale got the goals for the Flyers (31-36-9, 71 points), who won their third straight. Michkov and Travis Konecny assisted on both. Ivan Fedotov stopped 28 shots to earn his first win since March 1, ending a personal six-game losing streak. Zachary L’Heureux got the lone goal for Nashville. Michael McCarron and Brady Skjei got the assists for the Predators (27-39-8, 62 points), who have just four goals in their
RSS