After not homering in Yakult’s first 12 games, Munetaka Murakami needed only three more to hit his second Thursday, when Tomoyuki Sugano took his scoreless-inning streak to start the season into the Giants’ and Tigers’ low-scoring series at Koshien and the Orix Buffaloes and Rakuten Eagles played a rubber match in Sendai.
After four out of 12 teams were shut out Wednesday, we came close to having two out of six on Thursday, but had to settle for one.
Thursday’s games
Tigers 2, Giants 1, 10 innings: At Koshien Stadium, Hanshin became the first team to score off Tomoyuki Sugano, with Shota Morishita doing the honors in the eighth after singles by pinch-hitter Ukyo Maegawa and Koji Chikamoto. The run scored on Sugano’s 112th pitch and snapped a 20-inning scoreless streak. Sugano struck out nine for the third time since 2021 while allowing six hits and two walks.
“It’s not like I’ve throwing any particularly good pitches, but I’ve been locating well,” the 34-year-old Sugano said after strikeouts got him out of a couple of early scrapes.
Teruaki Sato, who struck out three times against Sugano, singled in the winning run in the 10th.
Yuki Nishi allowed a run on four hits and a walk over eight innings. Sugano pitched out of a first-inning jam before Yomiuri took a 1-0 second-inning lead that was limited by a diving stop from Tigers second baseman Takumu Nakano, who had three hits and scored the winning run.
Buffaloes 7, Eagles 0: At Miyagi Stadium, Orix shut out Rakuten for the second straight day, while the bottom of the Buffaloes’ order, Kotaro Kurebayashi and Kenya Wakatsuki, did most of the damage offensively.
Rakuten’s Seiryu Uchi (0-1) retired the first eight batters before Masahiro Nishino brought home Wakatsuki in the third with Orix’s third straight single. Nishino singled in Kurebayashi, Ryoma Nishikawa doubled and both scored on a two-run Yuma Tongu single. Kurebayashi doubled in the sixth and scored on a Wakatsuki single to make it 5-0, and singled in Yuma Mune in the eighth. Leandro Cedeno got in on the fun in the ninth with an RBI double.
Orix’s Ryuhei Sotani (1-1) struck out a career-high seven over five innings. He allowed two singles and issued two walks but left after just 67 pitches.
Swallows 11, Dragons 5: At Nagoya Dome, Keiji Takahashi (1-1) allowed three runs over five innings after Murakami and Jose Osuna did the heavy lifting and allowed the lefty to leave with a four-run lead.
Murakami plated Osuna with a two-out first-inning homer off Yuya Yanagi (1-1), who then surrendered a run on three straight singles before leaving the bases loaded by striking out Takahashi. Osuna’s second homer made it 4-0 in the second.
Yanagi got the Dragons on the board when he doubled to lead off Chunichi’s second and came home after two ground outs before a Seiji Uebayashi single scored Orando Calixte and Sho Nakata. Norichika Aoki drew a two-out bases-loaded walk on Yanagi’s 95th pitch. Yuhei Nakamura lined the 97th to right, plated Murakami with a single and chased Yanagi.
Osuna doubled with two outs in the fifth to score Yasutaka Shiomi. The Dragons scored two in the eighth but Osuna iced the game with a ninth-inning grand slam off Daisuke Sobue.
