Behind a four-run sixth that included a two-run blast by Pan “TAKE” Wu-hsiung, the Uni-President Lions roughed up the previously red-hot Chinatrust Brothers 8-3 at the Sinjhuang Baseball Stadium in New Taipei City last night to start their three-game series on a high note.
The win not only nipped a four-game winning streak for the top-ranked Brothers, but also cut their lead over the second-placed Lions to just two games as the Cats look to make up some ground against the league leaders with a strong showing over the weekend.
Knowing they needed a fast start against the in-form Brothers, the home Lions wasted little time getting on the board with a pair of runs in the opening frame when Liu Fu-hao went deep against Brothers starter Lin Ying-chieh with a two-run blast.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times
After a scoreless second and third, Uni-President doubled their lead in the fourth, with Kuo Fu-lin legging out an infield single against Lin Ying-chieh and scoring on Lin Chih-hsiang’s sacrifice fly before Liu singled in his third RBI of the game one batter later.
The 4-0 lead stood through the fifth, with starter Chiang Chen-yen holding his ground in a three-hit gem before the Brothers finally struck for three against the lefty out of Taichung’s Shiyuan High School on the strength of back-to-back extra-base hits by Chang Cheng-wei and Chang Chih-hao, and a sacrifice fly by Chiang Chih-hsien to make it 4-3.
That set up a game-turning four-run sixth, which put the Lions ahead for good as Chiang Chen-yen shook off the sixth with a strong seventh before reliever Lin Tzu-wei took on mop-up duty with a scoreless eighth and ninth to preserve the win.
Picking up his fifth win of the year was Chiang Chen-yen, who allowed three runs on seven hits over as many innings with nine strikeouts to beat his counterpart Lin Ying-chieh, who fell to an even 4-4 mark for the season.
RHINOS 6, MONKEYS 8
The Lamigo Monkeys took it to the EDA Rhinos with a win over the visitors at the Taoyuan International Baseball Stadium.
Mitch Atkins overcame a slow start in which he gave up three quick runs over the first two frames by holding the Rhinos offense to only one more run through the sixth to pick up win No. 8 of the season.
Offensively for the victors, Lin Chih-sheng’s three RBIs led a Monkeys lineup, who plated six runs over the first three innings against Rhinos starter Ni Fu-teh.
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