In the past week, it’s begun looking like NPB has now retired the remaining substandard baseballs that had been produced for the 2024 season and has been replacing them with balls originally intended to be put in play next year. Mind you, that’s not a data-based conclusion but an observation, so it might be wrong.
Nevertheless, the Pacific League saw three complete-game victories Tuesday, two of them shutouts, while two DeNA pitchers combined for another in Hiroshima.
In other news, the Giants’ Elier Hernandez is out, and I’ll get to that after today’s games. On Monday, Akinori Iwamura announced that this would be his last year as manager of the independent BC League’s Fukushima Red Hopes to take responsibility for the club’s poor results. Iwamura founded the club along with a women’s team, and has served as its chairman.
Tuesday’s games
Hawks 6, Lions 1: At the domed stadium formerly known as “Prince,” Seibu scored first, but Livan Moinelo put a stop to that nonsense while Kensuke Kondo went 3-for-3 with two homers, two walks, three runs and three RBIs. Moinelo allowed two hits and a walk over the distance while striking out six.
Seibu scratched out a first-inning run on a leadoff walk, a Sosuke Genda single and a Takayoshi Yamamura sacrifice fly. Moinelo, however, retired 20 straight hitters after Genda’s single. The loss was Seibu’s eighth straight. Former Lion Hotaka Yamakawa went 2-for-5 but failed to homer for the fifth straight game.
BayStars 6, Carp 0: At New Hiroshima Citizens Stadium, Katsuki Azuma (9-2) got a big early lead and then threw eight scoreless innings while allowing three hits and no walks.
Tyler Austin‘s three-run homer, his 19th, capped DeNA’s four-run first off Yusuke Nomura (0-1). Keita Sano, who singled in a first-inning run, opened the BayStars’ sixth by reaching on an error and Austin reached on an infield single to set the table for a two-run inning.
Sano, whose amateur career followed in Nomura’s footsteps at the same youth club team, the same high school, and the same university, said, “I was looking forward to facing him and I’m happy to have gotten a hit off him.”
Eagles 3, Buffaloes 0: At Osaka UFO Dome, Takahisa Hayakawa (8-4) struck out nine and allowed two hits over the distance for his first shutout since his 2021 rookie season. Hiroto Kobukata singled, stole second and scored the opening run on a Kazuki Murabayashi third-inning single. He then walked and scored on Murabayashi’s two-run seventh-inning triple.
The Buffaloes managed four base runners, but Ryo Kita was caught stealing in the first and the other three were removed on double plays as Hayakawa faced the minimum over nine innings. If anything was missing, Hayakawa said, it was musical accompaniment
“When you come out to pitch the ninth at home, they play your walk-on music,” he said. “If I want that, I have to do it at home, I guess.”
Marines 6, Fighters 0: At Kitahiroshima Taxpayers Burden Field, Kazuya Ojima (8-8) threw a 105-pitch shutout as the Marines moved into second place ahead of the Fighters.
“It was pitching that everyone could learn from,” Fighters manager Tsuyoshi Shinjo said of Ojima. “He worked carefully and kept the ball down.”
Toshiya Sato broke the ice with a no-out two-run bases-loaded single in the fourth inning off Shoma Kanemura. Neftali Soto, who singled in the fourth, singled to open the sixth, followed by a Sato double, a Gregory Polanco sacrifice fly and an Atsuki Tomosugi run-scoring single. With one out and two runners in scoring position in the seventh, Soto singled in two.
Tigers 8, Giants 5: At Tokyo Ugly Dome, Ryo Watanabe broke a 5-5 seventh-inning tie with a three-run double, and Hanshin relievers Javy Guerra, Takuma Kirishiki and Suguru Iwazaki kept Yomiuri off the board over the final three innings.
Shota Morishita took Foster Griffin deep for a two-run first-inning homer, his 11th, and Yoshihiro Maru got one of those back on Hiroto Saiki‘s third pitch of the game with his 10th home run. Seiya Kinami‘s two-out fourth-inning bases-loaded double made it 5-1 before the Giants solved Saiki in the fifth.
Coco Montes, batting for Griffin, doubled in two. Naoki Yoshikawa doubled in one and Hayato Sakamoto tied it with an RBI single. The Tigers untied it in the seventh on Watanabe’s three-run double.
Dragons 5, Swallows 4: At Jingu “Tokyo’s sacrifice to corporate greed and governmental malfeasance” Stadium, Hiroto Takahashi (10-1) lacked his “A” control, walking three batters and allowing two runs over six innings, but seven strikeouts and a credible effort from the bullpen allowed Chunichi to hold on.
Kaito Muramatsu doubled to open the fourth and scored the opening run off Miguel Yajure (5-9). Muramatsu’s two-out infield single sparked a three-run rally that included an RBI infield single by Takahashi that chased Yajure, and a bases-loaded walk from the next pitcher, Taichi Yamano.
Hideki Nagaoka, whose first-inning infield single had been Yakult’s only hit off Takahashi singled to open the sixth and scored on a double by Munetaka Murakami, who scored on a Jose Osuna single. Murakami singled in the Swallows’ third run in the eighth, but reliever Kento Fujishima took over and pitched out of the two-on, no-out jam to preserve the lead.
Swallows reliever Taichi Ishiyama made Yakult’s ninth-inning task harder by surrendering a run after allowing back-to-back no-out singles to Orlando Calixte and Seiya Hosokawa. Raidel Martinez opened the door for a comeback by hitting the first batter he faced only to get ace pinch-hitter Shingo Kawabata to hit into a double play ahead of Shu Masuda‘s pinch-hit home run. Martinez surrendered a two-out single but got out of the inning before Murakami came to the plate.
Giants’ Hernandez likely out for season
The Yomiuri Giants learned Monday that first-year outfielder Elier Hernandez would likely be out for the remainder of the season with a broken left wrist suffered Sunday when he tried to make a sliding catch in center field in Nagoya.
In 56 games since joining the Giants in May, the 29-year-old has eight home runs with 34 runs and 30 RBIs, and has slashed .294/.346/.452, while playing mostly in center field and batting third. The injury was reported to be similar to the one that ended Hideki Matsui‘s major league consecutive-games streak with the New York Yankees.
