Tag Archives: Livan Moinelo

NPB news: July 21, 2024

Nippon Professional Baseball played its final games Sunday before this week’s all-star break, with Tomoyuki Sugano picking more low hanging fruit with some help from a new teammate. Livan Moinelo was solid again, Tyler Austin hit another big homer on a night when no matter how many DeNA hit, it wouldn’t be enough.

Nippon Ham came from behind twice thanks to an outstanding effort from its bullpen, while Orix and Hiroshima got crushed in Kansai.

Sunday’s games:

Giants 4, Dragons 1:  At Nagoya Dome, Tomoyuki Sugano allowed a run over six innings and new Giant Gakuto Wakabayashi hit a two-run home run to lead Yomiuri past Chunichi.  Yomiuri, looking for its first Central League pennant in four years, bounced back from a 1-0 loss on Friday to take the final two games of the series.

The 34-year-old Sugano, a two-time winner of the Eiji Sawamura Award as Japanese pro baseball’s most impressive starting pitcher, improved to 8-2. He allowed five hits while striking out five and walking none.

Wakabayashi made it 2-0 Giants in the fifth inning with his first home run since being traded from the Pacific League’s Seibu Lions on June 25.

With a four-run lead in the sixth, Sugano surrendered a home run to Sho Nakata, who was released by Yomiuri in December, two and a half years after he was discarded by Nippon Ham.

Six of Sugano’s wins have come against the worst two CL teams, three each against the fifth-place Dragons and last-place Swallows. His other two came against title-contender Hiroshima, and the team with Japan’s worst record, the Seibu Lions.

Continue reading NPB news: July 21, 2024

NPB news: April 27, 2024

In which Japanese pro baseball’s answer to the questions from Mad Magazine’s “Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions” reached a new low, and we had some fun games as well.

Fukuoka Dome held its first game under its latest incarnation, see Thursday’s blog, and it seemed as if the broadcasters had a contractual obligation to mention the ballpark’s new naming sponsor a certain number of times, as they brought up the monumental occasion over and over, and even asked the game’s hero about it.

Saturday’s games

Giants 2, BayStars 1: At Yokohama Stadium, Kai Yokogawa (1-0) worked five scoreless innings, Kazuma Okamoto hit a second-inning leadoff homer off Anthony Kay (1-2) – who went seven innings, rookie Masaya Hagio followed with a single and scored on a sac fly by Takumi Oshiro. The BayStars got on the board on Toshiro Miyazaki‘s seventh-inning leadoff homer. Taisei Ota recorded his seventh save.

BayStars left fielder Taiki Sekine, who turned in a big catch on Friday gunned down two runners Saturday as they tried to stretch singles into doubles for his first two assists of the season. The only player in NPB with more than two is Nippon Ham’s Chusei Mannami, with four.

Continue reading NPB news: April 27, 2024