Interleague Day 16 See-saw game

The Central League’s Hanshin Tigers took Round 1 of the showdown between league leaders on Friday thanks to a two-run homer by Jefry Marte that downed the Pacific League-leading Rakuten Eagles.

A day after the PL took their first lead in interleague wins, the CL had one of its best days, going 5-1, outscoring the PL 19-12. The CL now leads 42-40 with 11 ties, while the PL leads in runs scored 412-372, and the Buffaloes, thanks to a gem from Yoshinobu Yamamoto, now lead the interleague standings.

Saturday’s ound 2 between the Tigers and Eagles will be youth, Hanshin rookie Masashi Ito, vs experience, Eagles veteran Masahiro Tanaka

Close shave for Miyagi

Nineteen-year-old Orix Buffaloes lefty Hiroya Miyagi, who has surprised everyone with his maturity on the mound, delivered another surprise on Friday, when he turned up for practice with his long curly locks replaced by a buzz cut, Nikkan Sports reported.

“One my older teammates cut it for me, but I thought he was going to cut it down to 9 millimeters,” Miyagi said. “But he forgot to put on the attachment and instead cut it down to half a millimeter.”

Tigers 3, Eagles 2

At Sendai’s Rakuten Seimei Park, Hanshin side-armer Koyo Aoyagi (5-2) gave up two runs, on a first-inning error and a Hiroaki Shimauchi triple, and on Eigoro Mogi’s 10th home run, in the second, but lasted eight innings. Tigers rookie Teruaki Sato manufactured a fifth-inning run off Hideaki Wakui (6-4) through a leadoff walk, a two-out stolen base, a throwing error and a Yoshio Itoi infield single.

Jefry Marte turned the game around in the sixth when he put the fat part of the bat on a fat hanging slider for his 12th home run. Robert Suarez worked the ninth for his Japan-best 20th save.

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Buffaloes 4, Carp 0

At Osaka‘s Kyocera Dome, Orix’s Yoshinobu Yamamoto (6-5) was the story as he retired the first 21 batters he faced, and then with a 3-0 lead, allowed two no-out singles in the eighth before notching the last three of his 15 strikeouts and leaving after the eighth.

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You’ve got to love Yamamoto, but when you’re a star – even if you’re only 22 – you’re allowed to say, “Yes. I was thinking about throwing a perfect game from the third inning.” Even guys who know they can say that because of their status, however, still want to send the right message to the folks watching, and say something like, “Gosh. No. I was ignoring it the whole time and doing my best not to think about it.”

Carp rookie Haruki Omichi walked two of the first three batters he faced before retiring the next 14 and leaving his first career start after five hitless innings.

Robert Corniel worked a 1-2-3 sixth before the Buffaloes found a way onto the scoreboard against Hiroshima’s bullpen. Masataka Yoshida drew his second walk of the game to lead off the seventh against rookie Daisuke Moriura (2-2). Takahiro Okada found a hole with a ground ball for the game’s first hit. After a sacrifice, Adam Jones drew a pinch-hit walk against Ren Nakata.

Yutaro Sugimoto went down for a 2-2 forkball out of the zone and looped it over the infield for a two-run single. A single and a walk made it 3-0, and the Buffaloes added an unearned run in the eighth after a Yoshida double and an Okada single.

Yamamoto’s fastball has been kind of hit and miss this year, but it was about as good as it gets on Friday but his curve, a pitch he doesn’t throw a lot was dynamite, and the split worked well enough. And that was the game.

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Swallows 1, Hawks 0

At Fukuoka’s PayPay Dome, Yakult’s 41-year-old Masanori Ishikawa (2-1) won a duel with SoftBank’s 29-year-old Shuta Ishikawa (3-5), who allowed one run over eight innings, on Munetaka Murakami’s Japan-best 19th home run. Ishikawa the elder had a devil of a game. He gave up six singles but no walks while striking out six over six innings.

Noboru Shimizu, who lost Thursday’s game when he surrendered a tie-breaking homer to Brandon Laird, loaded the bases after were out in the eighth but escaped on a called third strike. Scott McGough struck out two in a 1-2-3 ninth for his ninth save.

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BayStars 4, Fighters 0

At Sapporo Dome, Tyler Austin hit his 13th home run with a man on in the first off Chihiro Kaneko (0-3, and Haruhiro Hamaguchi (4-4) threw a four-hitter while walking two and hitting one. Nippon Ham loaded the bases with two outs in the ninth before Hamaguchi retired Yuki James Nomura on his 138th pitch.

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Dragons 6, Lions 5

At MetLife Dome, after getting shellacked by the Yakult Swallows in his previous start, Seibu’s Kona Takahashi (5-2) cut his hair, but whatever adjustments he made didn’t help the Lions defense which crashed and burned in a three-run fourth. Takahashi allowed five runs, two earned, in three-plus innings.

Yudai Ono (3-4) allowed three runs over seven innings after being gifted a 5-0 lead. Wataru Takamatsu singled, stole second and scored the opening run on Yohei Oshima’s third-inning single. Oshima stole second went to third on the second of Naomichi Donoue’s four hits and scored on a Shuhei Takahashi sac fly.

A single opened the Dragons’ fourth before two consecutive batters reached on errors, and the next on a fielder’s choice. A Donoue ground single up the middle made it 5-0.

The Lions, however, gave Chunichi a scare. Hotaka Yamakawa hit a mammoth two-run homer, his ninth, in the fifth inning, and doubled and scored in the seventh. Wu Nien-ting and Yamakawa singled in runs in the eighth, and Seiji Kawagoe singled in the ninth but recorded the final out at the plate trying to score the tying run from first on a Takeya Nakamura single. Katsuki Matayoshi hung on to record his seventh save.

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Giants 5, Marines 1

At Chiba’s Zozo Marine Stadium, Yomiuri lefty C.C. Mercedes (2-0) allowed a first-inning run with Brandon Laird singling in Shogo Nakamura with one out, but that was it. He went seven innings, allowed seven hits, a walk and hit a batter while striking out six.

Hiroyuki Nakajima tied it in the fourth, singling in Kazuma Okamoto off Fumiya Motomae, who left after allowing a run over six innings. The wheels came off for Lotte in a four run eighth against Yuta Omine (1-1), on doubles by Seiya Matsubara and Zelous Wheeler and Okamoto’s 17th home run to make it 3-0. Two more singles and right fielder Leonys Martin’s second fumble of the inning made it 4-0.

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Interleague

Starting pitchers

Fighters vs BayStars: Sapporo Dome 2 pm, 1 am EDT

Takahide Ikeda (2-6, 2.92) vs Masaya Kyoyama (0-2, 8.27)

Eagles vs Tigers: Rakuten Seimei Park Miyagi 2 pm, 1 am EDT

Masahiro Tanaka (2-3, 2.77) vs Masashi Ito (3-3, 2.70)

Lions vs Dragons: MetLife Dome 2 pm, 1 am EDT

Tatsuya Imai (3-2, 2.53) vs Yuichiro Okano (-)

Marines vs Giants: Zozo Marine Stadium 2 pm, 1 am EDT

Manabu Mima (3-3, 4.76) vs Shosei Togo (5-3, 4.42)

Buffaloes vs Carp: Kyocera Dome (Osaka) 2 pm, 1 am EDT

Daiki Tajima (2-4, 4.72) vs Masato Morishita (3-3, 2.11)

Hawks vs Swallows: PayPay Dome 2 pm, 1 am EDT

Nick Martinez (5-1, 2.13) vs Yasuhiro Ogawa (5-1, 3.41)

Active roster moves 6/11/2021

Deactivated players can be re-activated from 6/21

Central League

Activated

Giants	P	90	Natsuki Toda
Giants	IF	6	Hayato Sakamoto
Tigers	IF	33	Kento Itohara
Carp	IF	69	Ryutaro Hatsuki

Dectivated

Giants	P	15	Angel Sanchez
Giants	IF	29	Naoki Yoshikawa
Tigers	P	44	Raul Alcantara
Carp	IF	6	Tomohiro Abe
Swallows	P	54	Cy Sneed

Pacific League

Activated

Hawks	IF	00	Hikaru Kawase
Fighters	P	39	Ryo Akiyoshi
Fighters	P	49	Katsuhiko Kumon

Dectivated

Hawks	IF	23	Ukyo Shuto
Marines	P	17	Roki Sasaki
Lions	P	27	Tetsuya Utsumi
Eagles	P	57	Ryota Takinaka
Fighters	P	58	Masaki Tanigawa
Buffaloes	P	26	Atsushi Nomi