No, not the official ones selected by someone nominated by the awards’ insurance company sponsors but the jballallen.com position players and pitchers of the month. I’ll give defense its due when NPB’s hitter award doesn’t, and put less emphasis on feel-good anecdotes the way they did in May — see “3 hits and a near miss.”
Central League
Tyler Austin of the DeNA BayStars was ignored by the insurance company guys in May, but in June, he gets a second straight jballallen.com CL position player of the month award. Unfortunately, no cash prizes are awarded.
In June, Austin tied for second in the CL in home runs with nine, was second in RBIs with 25, tied for second in runs scored, posted a CL-best .506 on-base percentage, led in slugging by a wide margin, and by batting .406, all but ensured the insurers will pay off on his claim.
Koyo Aoyagi of the Hanshin Tigers led the CL in ERA and innings pitched with 30 and was second in strikeouts with 24. He also went 4-0.
Pacific League
Yutaro Sugimoto of the Orix Buffaloes will probably also get the insurer’s stamp of approval. His 15 runs were second in the PL, while he led with 19 RBIs, and tied for third with five homers behind the six hit Hotaka Yamakawa and Yuki Yanagita. Sugimoto’s .438 OBP was third behind Buffaloes’ leadoff man Shuhei Fukuda’s .466 and Kensuke Kondo’s .456, and he led the league in slugging. So a complete package.
Yoshinobu Yamamoto of the Orix Buffaloes, threw together a league-best 0.64 ERA over 28 innings while striking out 39 batters. The only real contender for the June award is 19-year-old rookie teammate Hiroya Miyagi, who had a monthly MVP-caliber season, but that happens sometimes.
NPB’s batter and pitcher of the month awards will be announced Wednesday, and if they get these ones wrong, I’ll be really surprised.
A little less than two-thirds left in the 16th season of interleague play and the CL has a chance to win the most games for the second time. After Sunday’s games, the Central League leads 32-30-7 while trailing in runs scored 324-291.
It won’t be easy, considering the remaining games, except for a few makeups, will be played in PL parks. But as the announcer during Friday’s Dragons-Buffaloes game, “Hey, the CL is strong this year.”
Sunday marked Tomoyuki Sugano’s return after a month absence, and though he didn’t win, it was a good outing, while 40-year-old Tsuyoshi Wada turned back the clock in a dominant start and the PL’s Wu-Wang clan delivered more pop hits.
Fighters 4, Giants 2
At Tokyo Dome, Yomiuri ace Tomoyuki Sugano (2-3) returned from a month on the sidelines after suffering from right shoulder discomfort and had trouble putting hitters away, but he’s Sugano, so his troubles are not like other pitchers. The Fighters scraped two runs against him on three hits and no walks over five innings.
Speedy leadoff man Ryota Isobata manufactured one run and helped create another for the Fighters, when Haruki Nishikawa scored from second on his eighth-inning sacrifice. An error on the play set up Isobata to score the Fighters’ fourth run. The only reason Isobata was credited with an RBI on the play because the official scorer was jealous about Saturday’s bunt assault in Hiroshima.
For the second straight day, there seemed to be a psychic Taiwan tie-up as Wang Po-jung homered a few minutes after Seibu’s Wu Nien-ting homered down the road at Jingu Stadium against the Swallows.
Fighters rookie Hiromi Ito (3-4) worked around four walks to allow just one run on two hits over seven innings. The run came on a third-inning Seiya Matsubara double and a Zelous Wheeler single. Matsubara and Wheeler walked in the eighth and Matsubara came home on a Naoki Yoshikawa single.
Matsubara, who hit one of two ninth-inning homers off closer Toshihiro Sugiura on Saturday, lined out to end the game with the tying runs on base as Sugiura recorded his 11th save.
At Tokyo’s Jingu Stadium, Yakult’s Norichika Aoki second RBI double in a four-run eighth inning helped clinch a wild one. Wu’s sixth home run, a two-run third-inning blast, gave Seibu a 3-2 lead, that quickly evaporated. After homers by Aito Takeda and rookie Shinichiro Kishi, the Lions led 6-5 in the sixth.
Scott McGough, who blew a one-run save opportunity and took the loss on Saturday when he surrendered three home runs, retired the heart of the Lions order on Sunday to notch his seventh save.
BayStars 4, Marines 3
At Yokohama Stadium, DeNA squeeked out a win when Lotte left fielder Katsuya Kakunaka got turned around at the wall and failed to make a tough catch that would have ended the game in a 3-3 tie and instead became a two-out walk-off RBI double for Yamato Maeda.
The Marines rallied to tie it in the eighth on three two-out doubles by Shogo Nakamura, Leonys Martin and Kakunaka off Yasuaki Yamasaki, costing ace Shota Imanaga the win after he’d held Lotte to a run over six innings.
The BayStars took a 2-0 lead on homers by Tyler Austin, his 11th, and rookie Shugo Maki, his 10th, off Kazuya Ojima. With the game tied 3-3 and first base open, the BayStars walked Brandon Laird intentionally to face Yudai Fujioka, who’d doubled in Kakunaka in the fourth. But a day after the intentional walk blew up their game, this one paid off. Kazuki Mishima (1-3) worked the ninth, and the BayStars won it against Marines closer Naoya Masuda (0-4).
Buffaloes 4, Dragons 0
At Nagoya‘s Vantelin Dome, Orix’s Hirotoshi Masui (2-4) allowed a walk and a hit over six innings, while his teammates had the kind of three-run inning that makes Japanese analysts and announcers hyper ventilate with excitement, three RBI singles and a sacrifice bunt by the pitcher.
Koji Fukutani (3-5), Chunichi’s Opening Day starter, struck out seven while walking one over six innings, but gave up four runs on six hits.
Hawks 8, Tigers 3
At Koshien Stadium, 40-year-old SoftBank southpaw Tsuyoshi Wada (4-3) had his best start of the season, striking out eight, while hitting a batter and giving up four singles over seven innings. Takuya Kai drove in three runs for the second straight day, singling in two in a three-run first, and another in the eighth. Minor league infielder Masaki Mimori batted leadoff, reached base four times, scored three runs and tripled in another.
Rookie Junya Nishi (1-1) made an emergency start for Hanshin after Joe Gunkel was scratched with a sore throat but tested negative for the coronavirus. Nishi allowed three runs in three innings. Jefry Marte hit his 10th home run for the Tigers and rookie Teruaki Sato his 15th after the game was already out of hand.
Eagles 6, Carp 4
At Hiroshima’s Mazda Stadium, Rakuten’s Eigoro Mogi broke a scoreless tie with a fourth-inning RBI double off Koya Takahashi (2-2), and added a two-run home run, his ninth of the season.
Rookie lefty Takahisa Hayakawa (7-2) worked 5-2/3 innings. He left with two and both scored against Tomohiro Anraku on singles by rookie Kota Hayashi and Kevin Cron, who went 3-for-4 with a double.
Yuki Matsui worked the ninth to tie Hanshin’s Robert Suarez for the Japan saves lead with 17.
