September 22nd, 2012
Tokyo Swallows 9
Yomiuri Giants 3
Streak: Won 1 Last 5: WWWLW
(Tokyo Dome)
This game, played less than 24 hours after the Giants clinched the pennants was a pretty good barometer of which players had too much victory champagne last night. (I think the title goes to Toshiya Sugiuchi.) Meanwhile Ishikawa was coming into the game without a win since July 4. The results were awesome!
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | R | H | E |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Swallows | 1 | 0 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 9 | 12 | 1 |
| Giants | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 15 | 2 |
| W: Ishikawa (7-11) L: Sugiuchi (12-3) | ||||||||||||
Swallows | Giants |
||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Yoshiyuki Noguchi (LF) | 1 | Hisanori Chono (RF) |
| 2 | Yuhei (Takai) (CF) | 2 | Daisuke Fujimura (2B) |
| 3 | Hiroyasu Tanaka (2B) | 3 | Hayato Sakamoto (SS) |
| 4 | Wladimir Balentien (RF) | 4 | Shinosuke Abe (1B) |
| 5 | Shingo Kawabata (SS) | 5 | Kenji Yano (LF) |
| 6 | Shinya Miyamoto (3B) | 6 | Daisuke Nakai (3B) |
| 7 | Ryuji Miyade (1B) | 7 | Taishi Ohta (CF) |
| 8 | Yuhei Nakamura (C) | 8 | Kazunari Sanematsu (C) |
| 9 | Masanori Ishikawa (P) | 9 | Toshiya Sugiuchi (P) |
The Giants reshuffled their lineup to face the lefty Ishikawa, and also start more youngsters to play out the string. Meanwhile the Swallows also re-shuffled their line up to face Sugiuchi. While the Tsubamegun gang were huddled around the television questioning giving Noguchi the start at the leadoff spot, Noguchi led the game off with a double straight down the right field line. Yuhei attempted to bunt Noguchi over, but fell behind 0-2 and ultimately struck out swinging. Tanaka came up drew first blood with a double straight down the left field line. 1-0 Swallows The Swallows couldn’t stretch the lead any further, and there was some fear that the Swallows wouldn’t be able to get any more runs off Sugiuchi.
Those fears were laid to rest in the third inning. Ishikawa started things off with a bloop single to center. Noguchi followed with his own bloop single to center to put men on first and second. Sugiuchi fell behind Yuhei, 3-0 and ultimately ended up walking Yuhei to load the bases for Tanaka. Tanaka wasted little time, and took the first pitch he saw back up the middle to score 2 runs. 3-0 Swallows The hits kept coming as Balentien grounded a hit between second and third to score yet another run. 4-0 Swallows
The Swallows gave up their first out as Kawabata tak-bunted Tanaka and Balentien over to scoring position. After the play was over, the Swallows faithful suffered a minor heart attack as they were treated to a shot of Balentien writhing in pain at second base. Luckily, the drama was short-lived and Coco was able to stay in the game.
Miyamoto followed the injury scare with a double to score both runners and end Sugiuchi’s night. 6-0 Swallows The Giants brought out the righty Tahara, and the Swallows countered by ending Miyade’s day by bringing out Yuichi. Yuichi struck out swinging, despite getting ahead 3-0 earlier in the count, for the second out of the inning. Tahara walked Nakamura on four straight pitches to get to Ishikawa. The play backfired as Ishikawa managed to hit a broken bat grounder that forced Fujimura to make a athletic play just to field and throw the ball to first. Ishikawa would have been safe even if Abe fielded the ball cleanly, but the ball getting past him allowed Miyamoto the time to score from second base and Nakamura to get to third from first. 7-0 Swallows
Abe can’t field the ball from Fujimura
Tahara loaded the bases one pitch later by hitting Noguchi in the elbow, and Yuhei made him pay with a double to score two more runs. 9-0 Swallows
That was all the Swallows needed. Ishikawa pitched 7 innings of bend but not break ball, allowing just 1 run despite carrying multiple baserunners in 5 of his 7 innings. Oshimoto allowed 2 more runs in an ugly eighth inning appearance. The final score was 9-3 Swallows.
Notes
- The Swallows will go for their first series win in the Tokyo Dome since the season opener. The starters will be Roman and Houlton.
- 9 of the Swallows’ 12 hits on the day came in the first 3 innings.
- The Swallows were actually outhit 15-12.
- The Carp lost widening their gap to third place to 7 games.
- Hiroyasu Tanaka went 3-for-5 to extend his streak of multi-hit games to 6 games.
Ishikawa got his first win in 80 days.
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