Program Notes: News from Tuesday is late as my day job went into extra innings and I needed some time with the trainer afterward.
Tuesday saw more of last week’s drama, so cue the theme from “Rawide,”—rolling, rolling, rolling, and get your big home run bat flips ready for you know who. We also had a game called on account of darkness, while Freddy Galvis did his grand slam thing again.
Tuesday’s games
BayStars 4, Tigers 0: At Osaka Dome, DeNA ran over Hanshin. The BayStars, who were 33-41 on July 4 and 18-1/2 games out of first place jumped out to a three-run lead against Koyo Aoyagi (12-3), while Shota Imanaga drove in Yasutaka Tobashira with the second run and pitched six innings. Tobashira singled in Keita Sano in the third and blasted his 17th home run in the ninth.
Imanaga struck out eight to improve to 8-3.
Giants 6, Dragons 0: At Tokyo Dome, Tomoyuki Sugano (7-6) threw eight scoreless innings and Ian Krol competed the three-hit shutout. Yoshihiro Maru singled in the first, and Sho Nakata and Kazuma Okamoto had back-to-back RBI doubles off Akiyoshi Katsuno (0-2).
Nakata’s fifth-inning RBI single made him the 47th player to reach 1,000 RBIs. Maru capped the scoring with a seventh-inning two-run home run, his 24th.
Swallows 5, Carp 4: At Jingu Stadium, Munetaka Murakami was at it again, bringing Yakult from two runs down after Ryan McBroom hit a three-run first-inning home run, his 14th, and Tsubasa Aizawa’s sixth-inning sacrifice fly made it 4-2.
Forty-two-year-old Swallows lefty Masanori Ishikawa became the seventh pitcher to make 500 career starts. He made one really bad 3-1 pitch to McBroom, who delivered it into another zip code, after a dying-quale single and a walk, but then gritted it out to work five innings. Masato Morishita, who shut the Swallows out the last time he faced them, allowed two runs over five innings in which he gave up seven hits and five walks.
Murakami’s huge home run was his 46th of the season and the 150th of his career, and his bat toss made it look like he’s had it with that piece of wood.
Scott McGough allowed a ninth-inning single and committed a two-base error on a pickoff throw but held on for his 31st save.
Lions 5, Marines: At Chiba Marine Stadium, Wu Nien-ting singled in two first-inning runs off Ayumu Ishikawa (6-5), Takumi Kuriyama drove in single runs with RBI doubles in the fourth and sixth innings, and Shuta Tonosaki had one in the fifth before Lotte started to climb back in the game. Kona Takahashi (8-7) allowed three runs over six innings, and five relievers kept the game from getting away with Tatsushi Masuda getting his 26th save.
Hawks 15, Eagles 6: At Miyagi Stadium, Shuta Ishikawa (5-7) got a big early lead, gave up a career-high 12 hits and allowed six runs over 6-2/3 innings but got the win. Takahiro Norimoto (7-8) allowed six runs through three, but Ryota Ishibashi did even worse in his three innings as the teams combined for 36 hits. Freddy Galvis hit a sixth-inning grand slam for the Hawks his second home run and slam, while Kenta Tanigawara reached base on a sacrifice, doubled twice, tripled twice, scored four runs and drove in four.
The Eagles’ bright spot was Chris Gittens going 2-for-5 in his second game. He was hurt in his April 5 season debut. In 15 Eastern League farm games Gittens slashed .351/.500/.730.
Fighters 0, Buffaloes 0, 7 innings, darkness: At Kushiro Stadium, a game was called on account of darkness for the second time in three years, when dark overcast skies convinced the umps to end this one in which Orix managed to strand 12 runners.
Wednesday’s starting pitchers
Fighters vs Buffaloes: Obihiro no Mori Stadium 1 pm, 12 midnight EDT
Kenta Uehara (3-4, 2.94) vs Daichi Takeyasu (2-0, 3.15)
Eagles vs Hawks: Miyagi Stadium 6 pm, 5 am EDT
Wataru Karashima (4-2, 2.80) vs Colin Rea (5-3, 3.68)
Marines vs Lions: Chiba Marine Stadium 6 pm, 5 am EDT
Manabu Mima (6-6, 3.83) vs Katsunori Hirai (6-6, 2.70)
Giants vs Dragons: Tokyo Dome 6 pm, 5 am EDT
Haruto Inoue (0-0, 6.00) vs Takahiro Matsuba (5-4, 3.09)
Swallows vs Carp: Jingu Stadium 6 pm, 5 am EDT
Hirotoshi Takanashi (6-6, 2.99) vs Allen Kuri (5-7, 2.99)
Tigers vs BayStars: Osaka Dome 6 pm, 5 am EDT
Masashi Ito (8-4, 1.91) vs Haruhiro Hamaguchi (5-4, 2.60)
Active roster moves 8/23/2022
Deactivated players can be re-activated from 9/2
Central League
Activated
| Swallows | P | 19 | Masanori Ishikawa |
| Tigers | OF | 5 | Koji Chikamoto |
| Giants | IF | 00 | Dai Yuasa |
| Giants | IF | 5 | Hiroyuki Nakajima |
| Dragons | P | 13 | Yuki Hashimoto |
| Dragons | IF | 48 | Hayato Mizowaki |
| BayStars | OF | 8 | Kazuki Kamizato |
Dectivated
| Swallows | P | 43 | Daiki Yamamoto |
| Tigers | P | 54 | Ren Kajiya |
| Carp | OF | 9 | Shogo Akiyama |
| Dragons | IF | 37 | Taiki Mitsumata |
Pacific League
Activated
| Buffaloes | IF | 31 | Ryo Ota |
| Marines | P | 29 | Yuji Nishino |
| Eagles | IF | 42 | Chris Gittens |
| Eagles | OF | 6 | Haruki Nishikawa |
| Hawks | IF | 8 | Kenji Akashi |
| Hawks | OF | 64 | Yusuke Masago |
| Lions | P | 28 | Ryosuke Moriwaki |
Dectivated
| Hawks | OF | 9 | Yuki Yanagita |
