April 24th Nohmi v Maeda - Nohmi's complete game shutout

Nohmi's rehabilitation continues. Here he was once again excellent and despite a fierce Carp challenge had enough to keep them scoreless - a complete game shutout. One small cloud on the horizon. Nohmi threw 149 pitches and one hopes that this does not affect his pitching later on. Mayumi might have been better advised to pull him after the seventh. Baldris played instead of Hirano and did not look ready. He made a serious error and looked uncomfortable with the bat. Box scores

       1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E
Tigers 2 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 4 7 1
Carp   0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8 0

Starting lineups

Tigers
1. Akahoshi (Centre)
2. Sekimoto (First)
3. Toritani (Short)
4. Kanemoto (Left)
5. Arai (Third)
6. Sakurai (Right)
7. Baldris (Second)
8. Kanoh (Catcher)
9. Nohmi (Pitcher)

Carp
1. Higashide (Carp)
2. Akamatsu (Centre)
3. Amaya (Right)
4. Seabol (First)
5. Shima (Left)
6. Ishihara (Catcher)
7. Soyogi (Short)
8. Kokubo (Third)
9. Maeda (Pitcher)

Maeda would look out of sorts throughout his pitching stint and would last only five innings. His first innings to the Tigers started with a foul fly and then a walk. Things then seemed to go to pieces but not in any dramatic way. Just a steady dribble of runs. Toritani hit to set up runners on first and third and then Kanemoto walked to load the bases. Arai hit a deep sacrifice fly to left for the first run 1-0 Tigers, runners on first and second. Next batter was Sakurai who tried left first (the ball went foul and then decided to go right driving the ball nicely into the gap between second and right for another run 2-0 Tigers, runners on first and second. Toritani had to hustle as the pick up and throw from Amaya were good but he slid nicely in under Ishihara for the run. Baldris struck out to end the innings. Higashide led off the Carp first with a hit. Akamatsu bunted which drew Arai off his base, as he came in to make the throw. Higashide in a superb piece of running rounded second and slid safely into third. With one out, Carp were in a good position to reduce the defecit. Nohmi, though was having non of it and struck out both Amaya and Seabol to leave Higashide stranded on third. Tigers second was in similar vein, Kanoh led off with a hit and made second on Nohmi's bunt. Maeda who took the ball could have possibly picked Kanoh off but decided to go for the easy out at first. Akahoshi's ground out took Kanoh to third but it looked like the Carp would get out of this safely. However, Sekimoto hit very nicely into centre field and Kanoh was home 3-0 Tigers runner on first. Toritani was cleverly lured into grounding out to second to end the innings. Shima led off the Carp second with a hit. Nohmi struck out Ishihara looking and with Soyogi at the plate fired the ball to Sekimoto catching Shima unable to make safety in time. A very fine piece of work. Nohmi then went on to strike out Soyogi and end the innings. Here one began to feel that it might not be the Carp's night. Tigers third was quiet as Maeda found his feet and retired the batters in order. In Carp's third with two out Higashide hit, this like his first was a bounce hit but it went very high and Toritani could only stand and wait for it to come down by which time Higashide was safe on first. Next was Akamatsu who hit to Baldris. The pick up was good but the throw was poor, well to Sekimoto's left. The runners continued onto second and third but quick thinking by Sekimoto made sure that no-one got home. Once again Nohmi was up to the challenge striking out Amaya to end the innings.

Tigers fourth was also quiet with no one getting on base. Carp's fourth started with a Seabol hit. He was joined on base when Ishihara walked (Nohmi's first walk). Soyogi grounded out to second with took Seabol to third but then Kokubo flew out to Kanemoto and the innings was over. Tigers fifth started with an Akahoshi hit. Sekimoto shaped to bunt but Akahoshi decided to steal second which he did successfully. Sekimoto then bunted him to third, a dangerous position for Carp. Toritani was induced to ground out to second again, Higashide coming in very fast and locking the runner on third. Maeda now faced Kanemoto who hit one high to left. Shima coming in tried to slide but the ball landed just short of him for a lucky hit. Akahoshi was home 4-0 Tigers runner on first. Arai flew out and the innings was over. Brown started Carp's fifth with Hirose who pinch hit for Maeda. Maeda had not managed to control the game at all and had given up runs at a regular rate. Carp's second batter Higashide hit, his third of the night but Nohmi kept him on first as he retired the next two batters. To replace Maeda, Brown turned to Hayashi. This proved to be a sound move, Hayashi retired the batters in order and the Tigers sixth was quiet. Carp sixth saw Seabol lead off with a hit. Shima flew out but then Ishihara picked up his second walk of the night, runners on first and second. Soyogi was induced to strike out leaving Nohmi with one more out to get. This was Kokubo who grounded out to Toritani to end the innings.

Tigers seventh saw Akahoshi hit with one out but he stayed on first as Hayashi kept things tight. You felt that the seventh would be Carp's last chance with Tigers elite relief to come. With two out Nohmi walked Akamatsu and then Amaya hit, runners on first and second. However, in a superb bit of pitching Nohmi struck out Seabol swinging to end the innings. Tigers eighth was pitched by Dohmann and he retired the batters in order. What was surprising was that Nohmi returned for the eighth. He had already thrown 120 pitches which was enough. Nohmi responded well retiring the Carp in order. Tigers ninth was pitched by Takahiro Aoki and he retired the batters in order. This brought up Nohmi, would he be able to keep the Carp off the scoreboard. The answer was yes, he had no problems retiring the rather demoralised Carp batters in order for a complete game shutout. Tigers victory.

A friend of mine said that Nohmi needs consistency and also lacks the ruthlessness needed to make a good pitcher. He can pitch sublimely but needs to do it more often. Pairing him with Kanoh though lifts his game and he is possibly becoming the pitcher he should be. A note on Carp's new stadium as well. This is a nice modern friendly place. Not only do they allow jettos (other stadiums take note) but they also play Rokko Oroshi over the PA before the Tigers seventh which is a really nice gesture. Nohmi picked up his second win and second consecutive hero interview. He had pitched very well and shown some incredible pitching. Tigers had done very well with a fine victory.

Yeah, not sure why they wanted to let Nohmi get the shut out so bad. That's way too many pitches. And it wasn't like he was throwing a gem. The Carp had runners on constantly but just couldn't score. In any case, encouraging (and surprising!) to see two very solid outings in a row from Nohmi.
In fact, the pitching was obviously great all weekend. With Kurihara out, the Carp don't have a lot of pop in their line-up, but still a good sign to go the whole weekend giving up only 3 runs!
I was in Hiroshima for all 3 games and give the new park--despite the name of course--very high marks. Great place to watch a game and I'll definitely be back.

I was very impressed by Cheng - he really did look good and I have high hopes for him. His defence of a one run lead was excellent and it was only the mysterious balk that cost the Tigers the match.

Yeah, I was there and Cheng looked good. Gave up a few hits, but kept them from scoring, so that's the important thing. Sure didn't look like his first start of the year. Anyway, we could use another quality starter, so a good sign. The Carp's offense looked abysmal all weekend, so I won't get over optimistic, but it was a promising weekend for getting our starting pitching back on track.