Tag Archives: Tomoyuki Sugano

NPB 2020 8-4 Games and news

Martin’s on-target fire mission saves Marines

Lotte’s Leonys Martin may have gone 0-for-4 at the plate, but he threw a strike when it mattered, gunning down Orix Buffaloes pinch-runner Ryo Ota for the final out in the ninth inning before the game at Kyocera Dome ended in a 5-5, 10-inning tie.

The Marines were headed for a narrow victory thanks to an impressive start from right-hander Mima, but he tired in the seventh and the game went down to the late innings.

Takashi Toritani came in for the Marines at third base in the bottom of the ninth and two hard-hit smashes handcuffed him. The first resulted in the leadoff runner reaching. With two outs, a bad hop struck Toritani and bounced away for an RBI infield double. Adam Jones lined a single to right. Martin’s throw gave catcher Tatsuhiro Tamura a chance at a sweep tag. Ota, who never touched home, was called out.

Orix closer Brandon Dickson survived a scoreless 10th thanks to second baseman Shuhei Fukuda fielding a hard shot for the second out with a runner on third. Dickson then struck out Lotte leadoff man Shuhei Fukuda to send it to the bottom of the ninth. Lotte’s Yuki Karakawa worked a 1-2-3 10th and the game was called.

Mima brought his good stuff and outpitched Orix Buffaloes ace Yoshinobu Yamamoto but it was not enough to the Lotte Marines a win.

With a one-run lead from the get-go, Mima was in total. He was accurate with his bread-and-butter two-seamer that was moving particularly well and was routinely to located on the outside corner and was able to reliably get called strikes there well out of the zone.

Between the two-seamer tailing away from left-handed hitters, his fork change that was dropping well and an occasional slider and fastball to keep guys honest, Mima challenged hitters when he fell behind and missed barrels. As the game went on, he went more and more to the change and got swings and misses.

Yamamoto gave up a run in the first on a fly ball that fell perfectly in the gap in right center for a one-out double and a single from rookie cleanup hitter Hisanori Yasuda, who smashed a fat pitch up the middle.

With one out in the second, Yamamoto hit Tamura and walked Brandon Laird. Light-hitting Yudai Fujioka squared up a 1-1 cutter in the heart of the zone and drove it to the warning track in left over Takahiro Okada for an RBI double. Fukuda, a first-inning strikeout victim, lined a low fastball for a two-run single before getting run out on the bases to end the inning.

Jones opened the Buffaloes second with a line single. With one out after a force at second, Steven Moya nailed a slider up and over the plate and tripled to the gap in right to put the hosts on the board.

Fukuda belted a long home run fourth to make it 5-1 before the Marines rallied against Mima in the seventh. Moya bounced a well-placed grounder up the middle for a leadoff single, and Yuya Oda smashed one of the few straight pitches Mima threw in the zone all night for a double. Ryoichi Adachi swatted a single to make it 5-2 and drive Mima from the mound after his 99th pitch.

Lefty Takahiro Matsunaga took over with one out and two on. He walked the bases loaded before giving up a two-run pinch-hit single to Torai Fushimi. Another walk loaded the bases. Jones came up with a chance to put his team in front, but smashed a low 3-2 pitch to third for an inning-ending double play.

The Marines were denied an insurance run in the top of the eighth, when Oda threw a strike to the plate from center to cut down a runner trying to score from second on a two-out single against Tyler Higgins, the third Buffaloes pitcher.

Frank Herrmann worked a scoreless eighth for the Marines as the game hurtled toward its thrilling but indecisive finish.

Asamura finishes Eagles’ comeback

Hideto Asamura’s two-run home run capped a three-run eighth inning for the Rakuten Eagles and completed a 7-6 comeback win against the SoftBank Hawks at Sendai’s Rakuten Seimei Park Miyagi.

The Eagles scored three runs off Hawks ace Kodai Senga over six innings, but then scored four runs off SoftBank’s formidable bullpen. With two outs and one on in the seventh and Rei Takahashi on the mound, back-to-back singles by Hiroaki Shimauchi and Stefen Romero made it a 6-4 game.

Lefty Livan Moinelo (0-1) retired the first two batters. Daichi Suzuki doubled and scored on a Jabari Blash single, Asamura homered and Alan Busenitz worked the ninth for Rakuten to record his third save.

Senga gave up six hits, three walks and hit a batter while striking out six. Hawks lefty Hayato Yuge gave up five runs, three earned, on six hits and three walks over five innings.

Fighters punch out Lions’ Takahashi

Taishi Ota homered twice, walked twice and drove in six runs as the Nippon Ham Fighters hammered the Seibu Lions 11-4 at Sapporo Dome.

Naoki Uwasawa (2-1) allowed four runs over 5-2/3 innings but just one through the first five, during which the Fighters hammered Lions starter Kona Takahashi (2-4) for six runs over 4-1/3 innings. The right-hander, who has struggled with walks his entire career, allowed three hits but issued seven free passes.

Ota broke a 1-1 tie in the third inning with his fourth home run after Sho Nakata drew a two-out walk. Ota drew a bases-loaded walk in Nippon Ham’s three-run fifth, and belted a three-run homer in the sixth.

Fighters leadoff man Haruki Nishikawa singled twice and walked twice and scored three runs.

Giants ace Sugano holds off Tigers

Tomoyuki Sugano (6-0) allowed two runs over seven innings for the Yomiuri Giants in a 7-2 win over the Hanshin Tigers at Koshien Stadium.

Sugano went to the mound with a 1-0 lead and was not as sharp as usual. The right-hander allowed six hits and a walk, while striking out three.

The Giants opened the scoring in the first on a two-out solo home run from Hayato Sakamoto. Lefty Onelki Garcia (0-4) thought he had a called third strike on a 1-2 fastball in and above the belt. His 2-2 changeup missed up and Sakamoto drove it over the wall in center.

An even worse pitch ended up in exactly the same spot off the bat of leadoff man Takumi Kitamura in the third. A Takumi Oshiro double and a Yoshihiro Maru single made it 3-0 in the fifth.

The Tigers got two scoreless innings from right-hander Atsushi Mochizuki and a two-run homer from Jerry Sands. Koji Chikamoto reached on a ground single and Sands swung and missed at a fat slider in the heart of the zone before pulling one on the outside corner and driving it 10 rows back in left.

With Mochizuki out of the game, Oshiro singled in two runs in a four-run Giants eighth to seal it. Kosuke Baba allowed four unearned runs and committed one of the Tigers’ two errors in the inning.

Ino, Stars pen silence Dragons

Shoichi Ino allowed six hits without a walk over seven innings, and two relievers provided near-perfect relief in the DeNA BayStars’ 3-0 win over the Chunichi Dragons at Yokohama Stadium.

Dragons starter Koji Fukutani (0-1) allowed all three runs on seven hits and a walk. The BayStars scraped out a run in the fourth on two singles and a double play.

Fukutani was less fortunate in the sixth. A Takayuki Kajitani leadoff single and a Kazuki Kamizato double set the table with no outs, and Neftali Soto hit a comebacker that came off the pitcher’s body for an RBI infield single. Another shot up the middle got through the infield to complete the scoring.

Chono, Tanaka lift Carp past Swallows

Hisayoshi Chono and Kosuke Tanaka each hit a three-run home run for the Hiroshima Carp in their 6-3 come-from-behind win over the Yakult Swallows at Tokyo’s Jingu Stadium.

Swallows right-hander Hirotoshi Takanashi took a 3-0 lead into the seventh inning and left with two out and two on. Scott McGough entered and surrendered Chono’s first homer off the season. Noboru Shimizu (0-2) worked the eighth and gave up Tanaka’s third of the year.

Atsuya Horie (2-1) earned the win in relief for 1-1/3 innings of scoreless relief, and Geronimo Franzua earned his second save in the ninth. Carp starter Allen Kuri gave up three runs in four innings.

Reserve Swallows catcher Akihisa Nishida doubled in two runs in the second and doubled and scored in the fourth.

Carp looking for next manager: more nonsense

Yukan Fuji speculated Tuesday that the Hiroshima Carp may soon be seeking a replacement to take over next year from their first-year skipper Shinji Sasaoka, but as speculation goes, it’s pretty hollow.

These articles are generally a collection of criticisms from former players now working as analysts who would prefer to be coaching and who have ties with one or more of the potential candidates.

Like the propaganda launched recently against DeNA BayStars skipper Alex Ramirez, it includes extravagant projections for individual players and of the team that are given as certainties, thus providing “proof” that the manager’s policies are intolerably bad.

In this case Sasaoka is attacked for the failure of rookie right-hander Masato Morishita, who a former Carp player said should be a strong rookie of the year candidate, but who is floundering.

Morishita may not be taking the league by storm, but there is no reason to think he won’t be good based on what we’ve seen so far.

No mention was made of his peculiar usage of ace Daichi Osera, having him labor through a second-straight complete game to start the season when the buildup to the coronavirus-hit season has been anything but normal and fitness issues were expected.

The Carp have struggled, and the article mentions that since Yoshihiro Maru, the CL’s MVP in 2017 and 2018, left as a free agent to the Yomiuri Giants 1-1/2 years ago, things are in decline. Sasaoka’s failure, it seems has been his ability to make bricks without straw.

The article said that if Sasaoka is replaced it would be rare. It would be more than rare for the Carp. It would be unprecedented. The team has had three managers who lasted a year or less during a stretch from 1973 to 1975, but all three, Kaoru Betto (1973), Katsuya Morinaga (1974) and Joe Lutz (1975) all quit. The family-owned Carp have never fired a manager after one season. I wouldn’t expect Sasaoka to be the first.

The candidates listed were former Carp Hiroki Kuroda, Takahiro Arai and Tomoaki Kanemoto. It’s hard to imagine someone like Kuroda, who stoically bore the weight of his teams’ expectations with every pitch wanting the responsibility for a team on his shoulders.

Kanemoto had to be compelled to manage the Tigers and that didn’t go well. The easy-going Arai might give it a try, but someone would have to twist his arm a lot. A far better choice would be Ryuzo Yamasaki, their longtime former minor league manager or Giants batting coach Takuro Ishii, who finished his career there and then coached for the team.

Dragons activate 2018 top pick Neo

The Chunichi Dragons continue their cycling through their farm team rookies on Tuesday with the activation of Akira Neo, their first pick in the 2018 amateur draft.

Neo was a shortstop at baseball factory Osaka Toin High School (Ryosuke Hirata, Takeya Nakamura, Hideto Asamura, Tomoya Mori, Shintaro Fujinami). Four teams named him as their top draft pick in 2018, the same number that went after Hiroshima’s first-round signee, Kaito Kozono.

The left-handed-hitting Neo’s numbers suggest he was overmatched by Western League pitching last year, striking out in 28 percent of his plate appearances with little power. This year so far, he has have cut down on his strikeouts to about 22 percent of his plate appearances.

After making 24 errors last season, the most by any player in Japan’s two minor leaguers, Neo has spent most of his time this summer at second base, although the word is that the Dragons intend to give him playing time on the first team in the outfield.

Last month, Chunichi called up third baseman Takaya Ishikawa, their top pick last year, and then gave a few plate appearances to 18-year-old outfielder Yuki Okabayashi. Their fifth pick last autumn, Okabayashi, unlike Ishikawa and Neo, had been tearing it up on the farm team.

Active roster moves 8/4/2020

Central League

Activated

GiantsP92Shohei Numata
GiantsIF37Akihiro Wakabayashi
DragonsP69Tatsuro Hamada
DragonsIF7Akira Neo

Dectivated

None

Pacific League

Activated

LionsP13Kona Takahashi
EaglesOF25Kazuki Tanaka

Dectivated

None

Starting pitchers for Aug. 5, 2020

Pacific League

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

Nick Martinez (1-3, 3.79) vs Sho Ito (0-0, 0.00)

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

Hideaki Wakui (5-0, 2.89) vs Tsuyoshi Wada (3-0, 3.58)

Buffaloes vs Marines: Kyocera Dome 6 pm, 5 am EDT

Yu Suzuki (1-2, 6.04) vs Kazuya Ojima (2-3, 4.73)

Central League

Swallows vs Carp: Jingu Stadium 6 pm, 5 am EDT

Hiroki Onishi (0-0, 0.00) vs Yusuke Nomura (1-0, 0.64)

BayStars vs Dragons: Yokohama Stadium 6 pm, 5 am EDT

Haruhiro Hamaguchi (2-1, 3.28) vs Yuya Yanagi (1-1, 1.80)

Tigers vs Giants: Koshien Stadium 6 pm, 5 am EDT

Shintaro Fujinami (0-2, 3.46) vs Shosei Togo (3-2, 3.25)

NPB 2020 7-21 games and news

Sugano shuts out Dragons

Tomoyuki Sugano (4-0) struck out 11, while allowing three singles in a 4-0 win over the Chunichi Dragons at Nagoya Dome on Tuesday. The win was the Giants’ sixth straight.

Gerardo Parra opened the scoring in the third inning. He opened the inning with a single off of Dragons right-hander Takumi Yamamoto (1-3) and scored on Yoshiyuki Kamei’s two-out single.

Yamamoto left the bases loaded by getting cleanup hitter Kazuma Okamoto to ground out, but surrendered a leadoff home run to Takumi Oshiro in the fourth and a two-out, two-run shot to Okamoto in the fifth. It was Okamoto’s 10th of the season.

Sugano surrendered a leadoff single and a no-out walk in the first, but was virtually untouchable after that working batters over with his fastball, cutter and slider.

Yamamoto allowed four runs over 4-2/3 innings on eight hits and two walks. He struck out seven.

Swallows’ Hara beats BayStars in season debut

Yakult Swallows right-hander Juri Hara (1-0) overcame a rough first inning to earn his first win in a 6-4 victory over the DeNA BayStars at Yokohama Stadium.

After Norichika Aoki put the visitors up 2-0 with a home run off right-hander Michael Peoples (0-1), Takayuki Kajitani homered to open the bottom of the first.

Neftali Soto walked and Jose Lopez singled to put two on with no out, but Hara retired the next two batters before Tatsuhiro Shibata singled home two. With a 3-2 lead, Peoples fashioned three scoreless innings before the Swallows got to him in the fifth.

Back-to-back singles by Tomotaka Sakaguchi and Tetsuto Yamada were followed by doubles from Aoki and Munetaka Murakami. Edwin Escobar added a sac fly that made it 6-3.

Scott McGough allowed a run in the sixth, but 21-year-old Yugo Umeno and 23-year-old Noboru Shimizu added scoreless innings, as did journeyman closer Taishi Ishiyama, who recorded his fifth save.

Peoples was tagged for six runs on six hits and four walks.He struck out three. Edwin Escobar, who worked the eighth for the BayStars, surrendered a leadoff single before getting his cousin, Swallows shortstop Alcides Escobar, to ground into a double play.

Sands, Tigers batter Carp

Jerry Sands and three Hanshin Tigers teammates each drove in two runs in a 9-4 win over the Hiroshima Carp at Koshien Stadium outside Osaka.

Sands, who played in the majors for the Los Angeles Dodgers and led South Korea’s Korea Baseball Organization in RBIs last year, was in his second game in the No. 3 hole. His first-inning homer off right-hander Allen Kuri (1-2) tied it 1-1.

Kento Itohara hit a two-run homer for the Tigers in the third, and Sands singled in starting pitcher Takumi Akiyama, who had doubled to open the inning.

Akiyama allowed four runs on a walk and seven hits while striking out five.

Tigers first baseman Justin Bour remained out of the lineup for the second-straight game with strained right glutes.

Sugiura outpitches Senga in Fighters’ win

Right-hander Toshihiro Sugiura, who was principally employed as a short starter last season, allowed a run over six innings to earn the win as the Nippon Ham Fighters came from behind to beat Kodai Senga and the SoftBank Hawks 2-1 at Fukuoka’s PayPay Dome.

Sugiura (2-1) made 14 starts last season but only amassed 65 innings. On Tuesday, he walked two and allowed five hits, including a solo home run to Wladimir Balentien, while striking out four.

Trailing 1-0, Sugiura retired his final batter by striking out Balentien with two on in the sixth with a nasty splitter.

Senga (2-1) walked three, hit a batter and allowed six hits over 6-2/3 innings.

The Fighters tied it in the seventh on doubles by Toshitake Yokoo and Haruki Nishikawa. Senga left after allowing a single to right-handed-hitting Taishi Ota. Left-hander Shinya Kayama gave up the go-ahead run, when Kensuke Kondo singled on a 1-1 slider.

Katsuhiko Kumon allowed two runners in a scoreless seventh for the Fighters. Veteran lefty Naoki Miyanishi worked the eighth, starting with an impressive strikeout of slugger Yuki Yanagita.

With a 3-2 count, Yanagita appeared to be looking for one of Miyanishi’s bread-and-butter low-and-away sliders, but got fastballs instead. He managed to foul off two before swinging under a third.

Fighters closer Ryo Akiyoshi, who struggled in two of his last three games, worked a 1-2-3 ninth to earn his fifth save.

Buffaloes snap losing streak against Eagles

Orix catcher Kenya Wakatsuki hit a sixth-inning grand slam and the Buffaloes came from two runs down to beat the Rakuten Eagles 10-3 in a rain-shortened game at Sendai’s Rakuten Seimei Park Miyagi that was called in the top of the eighth.

Lefty Andrew Albers (2-2) allowed two runs on five hits while striking out one to earn the win for Orix. He gave up the game’s first run on a Jabari Blash solo homer in the second.

Adam Jones, dropped to the Buffaloes’ No. 6 slot, singled with one out in the sixth when his chopper to third evaded Daichi Suzuki’s stab. A single by rookie Ryo Ota and a walk by Ryoichi Adachi loaded them for Wakatsuki, who homered off a 1-2 changeup from Taiwan right-hander Sung Chia-hao (0-1).

Lions Marines

Corey Spangenberg had three hits and drove in three runs as the Seibu Lions came from behind to beat the Lotte Marines 8-3 at MetLife Dome in Saitama Prefecture.

Lions right-hander Tatsuya Imai (2-3) gave up three runs over five innings but was able to earn the win after Seibu took the lead in a three-run fifth against Manabu Mima (2-2).

Through four innings, the Lions could manage only one base runner against Mima, Takeya Nakamura’s fourth home run of the year in the second. But an infield single by Tomoya Mori, a single off the wall in center by Nakamura, and a walk to Takumi Kuriyama loaded the bases.

Spangenberg then smashed a first-pitch fastball from Mima past first base to tie it. A sacrifice bunt and a sac fly to deep right by Shohei Suzuki put the Lions ahead for good, and the Lions bullpen allowed just three runners to reach the rest of the way.

The Marines opened the scoring in the first when Leonys Martin’s fly fell for a double as Spangenberg in left and Suzuki couldn’t decide who would catch it. and scored on a single by rookie Hisanori Yasuda that nearly took off Imai’s head. Yudai Fujioka drove in single runs in the second with a booming double, and in the fourth with a broken-bat single to make it 3-1.

Active roster moves 7/21/2020

Deactivated players can be re-activated from 7/31

Central League

Activated

BayStarsP45Michael Peoples
DragonsP14Keisuke Tanimoto
SwallowsP16Juri Hara

Dectivated

DragonsIF9Shun Ishikawa

Pacific League

Activated

EaglesOF46Ko Shimozuru
MarinesP28Takahiro Matsunaga
FightersP57Toshihiro Sugiura
BuffaloesOF25Ryo Nishimura

Dectivated

None