Jefry Marte | jballallen.com

Interleague Day 15 PL goes in front

The Pacific League, which has led the Central League in interleague wins in 14 of the 15 previous interleague tournaments, and led the CL in runs scored in all 15, went 4-1-1 on Thursday to take their first lead this year with basically seven series remaining, six over the weekend at PL parks and three coronavirus makeup games from Monday to Wednesday in Hiroshima, giving the Carp a stretch of nine straight games.

The PL now leads in runs scored 400-353.

As a result of Thursday’s games, the Orix Buffaloes and PL-leading Rakuten Eagles took over the interleague lead with 9-5-1 records with the Chunichi Dragons a half-game back at 8-5-2. The Eagles will be at home when their interleague ends with a series against the CL-leading Hanshin Tigers, so it should be fun.

Yamaguchi to Giants

Shun Yamaguchi, the first player ever posted by the Giants — in a bizarre situation in which some of the team’s top executives were unaware they’d signed a free agent with a contractual obligation to post him — will return to the Giants after playing a handful of games for the San Francisco Giants’ Triple-A club.

Tigers 4, Fighters 2

At Sapporo Dome, Nippon Ham’s Robbie Erlin (1-2) put in a decent start, allowing a run over 4-1/3 innings, while Hanshin’s Raul Alcantara (2-1) held the Fighters scoreless through six-plus, leaving after a batted ball struck him on the ankle to open the seventh.

Rookie Takumu Nakano reached base four times and singled in the game’s first run in the fifth inning. Koji Chikamoto made it 2-0 with his fourth home run in the seventh.

Jefry Marte reached doubled and reached base three times, while Jerry Sands, playing first for a change, turned a nifty double play, had two singles and an RBI.

The Fighters scored a run off closer Robert Suarez and threatened but he made his escape with a double play to record his Japan-best 19th save.

Eagles 6, Dragons 2

At Rakuten Seimei Park, Rakuten leadoff man Hiroto Kobukata scored four runs, while No. 2 hitter Daichi Suzuki scored twice and drove in two with his third home run. Ryota Takinaka (5-2) allowed a two runs over five innings to earn the win, while Chunichi’s Akiyoshi Katsuno (3-4) gave up four over four.

Lions 5, BayStars 3

At MetLife Dome, it seems I need a word processor that appends every Lions player with the word “rookie” after rookie Junichiro Kishi led off the bottom of the first with a game-tying home run, his third, had three hits, scored twice and drove in two to help 39-year-old lefty Tetsuya Utsumi (1-0) earn the win after allowing three runs in five innings.

BayStars rookie Shugo Maki hit a two-run homer, his 11th, in the fourth to make it a 4-3 game but Takumi Kuriyama singled home Kishi in the home half. Yuya Sakamoto (1-2) took the loss after allowing four runs in 2-2/3 innings.

Seibu’s Kaima Taira tied the NPB record by pitching his 31st straight scoreless outing since the start of the season and earning his fifth save.

Marines 2, Swallows 1

At Chiba’s Zozo Marine Stadium, Yakult’s Munetaka Murakami took over the Japan home run lead with his 18th of the season, off 19-year-old rookie Roki Sasaki, who allowed a run over six innings – his longest pro start – while touching 155 kph (96.3 mph) in the first inning and sitting easily at 95 mph.

Brandon Laird broke up the 1-1 tie with his 15th home run, off Noboru Shimizu (0-3) in the eighth inning, while Naoya Masuda worked the ninth for his 16th save.

Cy Sneed started for Yakult and allowed one unearned run in five innings, although he twice left the bases loaded.

Buffaloes 6, Giants 0

At Osaka‘s Kyocera Dome, Orix’s Sachiya Yamasaki (2-5) walked one, hit two and allowed four hits over six innings, and the Buffaloes bullpen held the Giants to one hit the rest of the way.

Yomiuri’s Yuki Takahashi (6-2) had two bad innings, surrendering three in the first with Yutaro Sugimoto doubling in two, and three in the fifth on Takahiro Okada’s seventh home run.

Hawks 1, Carp 1

At Fukuoka’s PayPay Dome, 22-year-old Hawks leadoff man Masaki Mimori went 4-for-4 and tripled in the tying run in the eighth inning to take Colin Rea off the hook after he allowed a run Kevin Cron’s sixth home run in the third inning. Rea struck out seven and allowed four hits but no walks.

Sho Iwasaki worked a scoreless ninth to keep the Carp from winning. Hiroshima starter Shogo Tamamura went six innings, and rookie Daisuke Moriura worked the seventh before Takuya Kai singled to leadoff the eighth against Atsuya Horie.

The Hawks threatened to end rookie Ryoji Kuribayashi’s run of scoreless games since his debut, but stranded two runners when he struck out rookie pinch-hitter Tatsuru Yanagimachi to run his streak to 22 games.

Interleague

Starting pitchers

Fighters vs BayStars: Sapporo Dome 6 pm, 5 am EDT

Chihiro Kaneko (0-2, 4.50) vs Haruhiro Hamaguchi (3-4, 3.00)

Eagles vs Tigers: Rakuten Seimei Park Miyagi 6 pm, 5 am EDT

Hideaki Wakui (6-3, 4.08) vs Koyo Aoyagi (4-2, 2.31)

Lions vs Dragons: MetLife Dome 5:45 pm, 4:45 am EDT

Kona Takahashi (5-1, 3.79) vs Yudai Ono (2-4, 3.45)

Marines vs Giants: Zozo Marine Stadium 5:45 pm, 4:45 am EDT

Fumiya Motomae (1-1, 7.07) vs C.C. Mercedes (1-0, 0.00)

Buffaloes vs Carp: Kyocera Dome (Osaka) 6 pm, 5 am EDT

Yoshinobu Yamamoto (5-5, 2.29) vs Haruki Omichi (2-0, 3.20)

Hawks vs Swallows: PayPay Dome 6 pm, 5 am EDT

Shuta Ishikawa (3-4, 3.12) vs Masanori Ishikawa (1-1, 2.70)

Active roster moves 6/10/2021

Deactivated players can be re-activated from 6/20

Central League

Activated

Giants	IF	52	Takumi Kitamura
BayStars	P	41	Shuto Sakurai
Carp	P	65	Shogo Tamamura

Dectivated

Giants	P	35	Toshiki Sakurai
BayStars	P	93	Ko Nakagawa
Carp	P	19	Yusuke Nomura

Pacific League

Activated

Marines	P	17	Roki Sasaki
Lions	P	69	Yoshinobu Mizukami
Lions	IF	4	Kakeru Yamanobe
Eagles	P	64	Hiroyuki Fukuyama
Fighters	P	29	Kazutomo Iguchi
Fighters	P	44	Robbie Erlin
Buffaloes	IF	5	Masahiro Nishino

Dectivated

Lions	P	98	Matt Dermody
Lions	IF	63	Ryusei Tsunashima
Eagles	P	32	Alan Busenitz
Fighters	P	14	Takayuki Kato
Buffaloes	IF	64	Shinya Hirosawa

Interleague Day 4 — Sato makes it rain

The Pacific League teams returned home after going 5-9-2 during the week at the Central League parks, and though the PL won the three blowouts, the CL escaped with three wins on Friday, thanks to the heroics of rookie Teruaki Sato.

In Japan, a teru teru bozu, is a kind of talisman, made of cloth or paper in the shape of a Halloween ghost figure that kids hang from windows in hopes of bringing good weather.

In this case, Tigers fans must have been crossing an awful lot of fingers, because the rookie rained home runs, pulled into a tie for the CL home run lead with 13 and became the first CL rookie to hit three in a game since Hall of Famer Shigeo Nagashima in 1958.

Fighters 10, Dragons 1

At Sapporo Dome, the big matchup appeared to be Nippon Ham rookie Hiromi Ito (2-4, 3.67) against Chunichi’s Sawamura Award-winning lefty Yudai Ono (2-3), but that pitchers’ duel turned one-sided in a hurry as the Fighters outhit the Dragons 16-5.

Ono struck out two walked one and allowed 11 hits over four innings as he surrendered six runs. Only two Fighters starters didn’t score, and those two, Kensuke Kondo and Ryo Watanabe, combined to drive in seven runs.

Dayan Viciedo had three hits, including a double, that set up Chunichi’s only run.

BayStars 7, Eagles 6

At Sendai’s Rakuten Seimei Park, Yamato Maeda chased Hideaki Wakui (5-3), who allowed two two-out sixth-inning singles before Maeda’s second home run made it a 5-4 game.

DeNA rookie Shugo Maki scored twice, and his eighth-inning solo homer, his ninth, turned out big after closer Kazuki Mishima surrendered a run in the ninth and ended the game with the go-ahead run on base to record his seventh save.

Lions 10, Tigers 7

At MetLife Dome, Sato crashed this party with his three homer night to send the Tigers to their third interleague win, Jerry Sands also homered for Hanshin, while Jefry Marte and Yusuke Oyama each had one-out RBI singles in the ninth that made it a 7-7 game against Reed Garrett (0-2), who served up Sato’s third.

Robert Suarez struck out the side in the ninth for his Japan-best 15th save.

Wu Nien-ting had three hits. His RBI double tied it 2-2 it 4-4 in the sixth. After the Tigers moved ahead in the seventh on an Oyama RBI single, Takeya Nakamura two-run homer was the big blow in Seibu’s three-run seventh.

Carp 10, Marines 8

At Chiba’s Zozo Marine Stadium, it was open season on pitchers as Lotte scored four runs with the help of five walks off Takuya Yasaki, and Hiroshima did the same against rookie Shota Suzuki (1-3), who allowed nine hits in his four innings.

Alejandro Mejia had four hits and scored twice for the Carp, who got four RBIs from Ryuhei Matsuyma. Brandon Laird led Lotte’s offense with a two-run first-inning homer and an RBI on a flyout to second, with Leonys Martin walking and scoring both times.

Carp rookie Ryoji Kuribayashi worked a 1-2-3 ninth for his 10th save and remained unscored upon in 19 games.

Buffaloes 9, Swallows 2

At Osaka’s Kyocera Dome, Masataka Yoshida hit his 11th homer, a two-run shot in the first off Rick van den Hurk (0-1), while Orix ace Yoshinobu Yamamoto (4-5) had the kind of game we associate with him, two runs on three walks, five hits and nine strikeouts over seven innings. Kotaro Kurebayashi and Stefen Romero also homered for the Buffaloes.

Hawks 9, Giants 3

At Fukuoka’s PayPay Dome, Wladimir Balentien hit two of the SoftBank Hawks’ four home runs as the defending Pacific League champs crushed the Central League’s Yomiuri Giants 9-3 in interleague play on Friday.

Balentien’s first home run of the season, a solo shot off Seishu Hatake (2-3) broke a 2-2 tie in the second. His two-run shot in the fourth capped four-run rally and iced the game at Fukuoka’s PayPay Dome.

“From the first home run, I felt, I was able to get good swings and hit them both on the button,” Balentien said.

The Giants opened the scoring on a two-run error in the first before Ryoya Kurihara tied it in the home half of the inning with a two-run homer, his fifth. Yuki Yanagita’s 11th home run, a third-inning, two-run shot made it 5-2.

SoftBank right-hander Shuta Ishikawa (3-3) gave up three runs over six innings. He walked four, hit one and allowed five hits while striking out eight.

The Hawks and Giants have played the last two Japan Series, with the Hawks winning all eight games. The win was SoftBank’s 10th straight against Yomiuri, having won their final interleague game in 2019 and with no interleague last season.