September 8th Messenger v Yamai - Terrible

The one word comment by my wife sums up the Tigers performance. It just wasn't good enough. It was bad enough that a middling offense like the Dragons was able to score 10 runs against the Tigers but the failure of the and fielding indicated a lazy and slapdash performance. Teams have off days but honestly this is not the right time to chose to have an off day. Messenger after signs of improvement pitched abysmally - not first team level at all and his ejection came as a welcome relief otherwise the margin would have been bigger. Yamai had a rather easy ride without being very good at all. Nohmi is due to return for the decider and one hopes Tigers can pick themselves up and play at a higher level. Scores

         1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9  R  H E
Dragons  5 0 0 2 0 0 3 0 0 10 14 0
Tigers   0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0  1  9 2

Starting lineups

Dragons
1. Araki (Short)
2. Ohshima (Centre)
3. Morino (Third)
4. Wada (Left)
5. Blanco (First)
6. Fujii (Right)
7. Tanishige (Catcher)
8. N. Donoue (Second)
9. Yamai (Pitcher)

Tigers
1. Murton (Right)
2. Shunsuke Fujikawa (Centre)
3. Toritani (Short)
4. Arai (Third)
5. Brazell (First)
6. Kanemoto (Left)
7. Johjima (Catcher)
8. Saka (Second)
9. Messenger (Pitcher)

Messenger really cannot be considered a first team pitcher and even if a fill in pitcher is needed then he is not the one for the role. His pitching was so bad it was an embarrassment and also dangerous (vice Morino). Araki led off the first with a hit and then stole second. Ohshima hit to short where Toritani failed to get the throw away. Morino grounded out which moved Ohshima to second but kept Araki rooted on third. Then Wada walked as Messenger's control disappeared - bases loaded. Blanco worked the count full and then picked a loose pitch to hit to left - 2-0 Dragons, runners on first and second. Fujii hit his first pitch to left for a two base timely bringing home another run 3-0 Dragons, runners on second and third. Tanishige hit to Toritani whose throwing error allowed two more runs to score 5-0 Dragons with Tanishige on second. N. Donoue hit to set up runners on first and third. Next was Yamai who would hit but this time he would hit into a double play to end the innings. A terrible start by Messenger and a great start for the Dragons. Tigers needed to do something good in their first but didn't. Yamai actually took a lot of pitches to finish off the batters who made him work but he accomplished it. Messenger returned for Dragons second - an act of folly one would have thought and so it proved. Araki flew out but then Ohshima walked. Next was Morino who took a dead ball on the back of his head. Luckily the pitch hit his helmet and even though he went down he was OK. Runners on first and second and Messenger of course was ejected. He had shown no distinction at all and no ability which could be considered suitable for the first team. He really had been dreadful. Fukuhara took over and actually did rather well striking out both Wada and Blanco to end the innings. Tigers then had a real chance in their second which the blew. Arai was first and he grounded out to third. The problem with Arai at the moment is that he is on 96 RBIs and is worried about getting to 100 (in cricket the term is the 'nervous nineties'). Someone needs to sit down with him and calm him down. A hit would have been useful here because Brazell blasted a home run into the left stand 5-1 Dragons. Kanemoto hit and then Johjima hit - Tigers had runners on first and second with a good chance of generating more runs. However, Saka who shouldn't have been starting at all flew out to centre and then Lin (pinch hitter) flew out to short. It had been right to try a pinch hitter but both batters swung too soon and didn't make a vulnerable Yamai work. The latter had been let off the hook by poor batting. Nishimura pitched Dragons third and started with a hit to Fujii. Tanishige flew out to short and Toritani fired the ball to first to get Fujii off base - two outs. N. Donoue walked but Yamai flew out to third to end the innings. Nishimura had also pitched rather poorly and this time had been quite lucky. Murton hit to centre to lead off Tigers third. Both Shunsuke Fujikawa and Toritani struck out which wasn't good batting but Arai was able to hit to centre - runners on first and third. Brazell struck out swinging to end the chance. Yamai had escaped a second time. With each escape he grew in confidence.

Nishimura returned for Dragons fourth. Mayumi really didn't have much choice - he needed someone to eat up the innings though maybe Watanabe would have been a better choice for this purpose. Araki hit to centre and was bunted to second by Ohshima. It seems that even Dragons are not immune to 'pointless buntitis'. Next up was Morino who showing no ill effects hammered a loose pitch into the stand for a two run home run 7-1 Dragons. Wada grounded out and Blanco struck out but Tigers were digging themselves deeper and deeper into a hole. Tigers fourth was quiet - Yamai had no problems this innings. Dragons fifth saw Uezono and he had a rather shakey innings. Fujii hit to second and then Tanishige hit to set up runners on first and third with no outs. N. Donoue lined out to second - a nice piece of fortune and then Yamai struck out. Uezono walked Araki to load the bases but got Ohshima to fly out to short and end the innings. Tigers fifth was once again full of wasted chances. With two out Shunsuke Fujikawa hit and then Toritani hit - runners on first and second. Arai was next and he flew out to right - he has missed a lot of scoring chances recently and does need to settle down a bit. Dragons sixth saw Uezono retire the batters in order. Given that this was their cleanup this was good pitching and it was nice to see Uezono pitch up to his best. Unfortunately, Tigers sixth was also Yamai's best innings - he struck out all three batters he faced.

If Uezono was good in Dragons sixth he was awful in their seventh. He stopped bothering and started with a two base hit to Fujii. He then walked Tanishige. N. Donoue bunted the batters to second and third (pointless buntitis) which brought up Yamai. Why is it that Tigers pitchers cannot pitch successfully to pitchers? These are pretty much guaranteed outs except for poor pitching. Our pitchers throw too much rubbish and this leads them to get punished. It is time to dump Kubo (pitching coach). Quite clearly he cannot cure this problem and it is costing Tigers runs and victories - though not on this occasion. Yamai hit his second pitch to right bringing home a runner 8-1 Dragons, runners on first and third. Then Araki hit to right and another runner was home 9-1 Dragons. Ohshima hit a grounder but an error loaded the bases and with only one out Morino hit deep to right for the sacrifice fly 10-1 Dragons, runners on first and third. Wada grounded out to third to end the innings which was also the end of Uezono's hopes for returning to the starting rotation for this season. In desperation Mayumi put HIrano in to lead off Tigers seventh. He immediately hit but Uemoto (replacement second) hit into a double play and ended that hope. Murton then flew out off his first pitch to end the innings. Uezono was replaced by Sajikihara who struck out Fukuda (replacement first). Next was Fujii who hit a three base to centre over Shunsuke Fujikawa. This would have happened the day before if Asai had not been the centre. Fujii just missed the cycle by a home run but went five for five. Sajikihara then struck out Tanishige and got N. Donoue to ground out and end the innings. Nice pitching and a much improved showing. Tigers batting did nothing in their eighth, the batters had given up. In Dragons ninth Sajikihara retired the batters in order. For Tigers ninth Ochiai switched to Kobayashi who gave up a lead off hit to Brazell. Kanemoto flew out and this brought a pointless pitching change Dragons switching to Suzuki. There was no need for this at all and it was just as stupid as the bunts earlier. Johjima flew out to third and Asai then flew out to right to end the game. Dragons victory.

The gap between the sides returned to 0.5 but time is running out for the Dragons. They have played seven more games than the Tigers and four more than the Giants and can only take a 0.5 game lead over the Tigers if they win tonight. It isn't likely to be enough. Nohmi is due to return and Tigers do need a good game from him to retain the lead. Murton had a hit in this game and the Murton counted stands at 22.