October 12th - Iwata v Utsumi - The mess in the tenth

A light at the end of the tunnel. Mayumi may be sacked at the end of the season. He needs to reach the Climax Series and finish with a .500 win ratio to have a chance of survival. What seems to have clinched it (apart from the daily escalating number of telephone calls to Tigers HQ) was Sakai-owner watching the game last night. A translation of his comments reads, 'I was horrified by what I saw' This is understandable - Utsumi was actually there for the taking if the Tigers batters had followed Iwata's example of the first at bat. Iwata worked the pitcher and fouled off for a 10 pitch at bat. He made Utsumi work and this should have been the approach in the ninth and tenth. It wasn't. The handling of the top of the tenth was truly abysmal and words actually fail me. Uemoto and Fujii used as pinch hitters - it was almost as if Mayumi abandoned the innings and the possibility of victory. Then the replacement of a catcher calling superlatively by a second rate one for the bottom. Was it any wonder that the Giants won. The sad thing was a superb performance by Iwata was wasted - he was far better than Utsumi and really shone apart from one semi-error. Tigers deserve better than the clueless management they are getting. Scores

        1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 R H E
Tigers  0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0  0 1 5 0
Giants  0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 3x 4 6 0

Starting lineups

Tigers
1. Hirano (Second)
2. Shibata (Centre)
3. Toritani (Short)
4. Arai (Third)
5. Brazell (First)
6. Murton (Right)
7. Kanemoto (Left)
8. Komiyama (Catcher)
9. Iwata (Pitcher)

Giants
1. Sakamoto (Short)
2. Terauchi (Third)
3. Chono (Centre)
4. Abe (Catcher)
5. Ramirez (Left)
6. Tani (Right)
7. Kamei (First)
8. Fujimura (Second)
9. Utsumi (Pitcher)

Tigers started this game needing a win or a victory to ensure the series against the Giants was theirs. Giants had to win and both teams benefited from some superb pitching with Iwata in a class above Utsumi. However, make no mistake Utsumi was good. In Tigers first he did give up a hit to Shibata who beat Sakamoto to first. Shibata then tried to steal second with Arai at the plate but was thrown out. Giants first saw them struggle from the start - their batters falling to the Iwata/Komiyama combination in order. In Tigers second Murton walked with two outs but then Kanemoto was unable to do anything and flew out to short. All three batters in Giants second grounded out to Hirano. What was clear at this early stage was how much more economical than Utsumi, Iwata was. This would continue throughout the game. Tigers third was the first innings with the batters falling in order (there would be more of those) but we saw Iwata's superb at bat - taking 10 pitches and forcing Utsumi to work harder. He was thinking if no one else was. With the help of Komiyama, Iwata was keeping his pitches low and forcing the batters to ground out and this continued in the third (7 out the first 9 outs were ground outs) and once again the batters had gone down in order.

With two out in Tigers fourth Arai drove Utsumi to left for a two base hit. Things looked interesting but Brazell hit to centre where Chono had an easy take. Giants fourth was quiet with the batters falling once again in order - so far Iwata had been perfect whilst Utsumi had looked a little (though not much ) shaky. Tigers fifth saw Kanemoto collect a one out walk but then Komiyama fell to a magnificent pitch from Utsumi. Iwata of course didn't do anything and the innings was over. Iwata struck out Abe in fine style to start the Giants fifth and then they had a stroke of luck. Ramirez was the batter. He took a swing at his fourth pitch and got enough of the bat on it to carry it over the right wall for a solo home run 1-0 Giants. It was a speculative swing and didn't even go where Ramirez intended but he is a powerful guy. Tani hit to left and Tigers rapidly needed to pick themselves up. Iwata did so very well and got Kamei to ground out forcing out Tani. He then struck out Fujimura looking - a fine piece of teamwork by Komiyama and Iwata to and the innings. Tigers then responded in just the right fashion in the sixth. Hirano singled to centre. He was bunted to second by Shibata and then Toritani sent one screaming along the first baseline past the ineffective dive of Kamei. Hirano was home 1-1 scores tied, runner on first. Arai flew out in foul ground and Brazell struck out but the Tigers were back on level terms. Giants couldn't rebuild the momentum of the fifth and the sixth saw the batters fall in order with Iwata striking out two.

Murton struck out to lead off Tigers seventh and then Kanemoto hit. He was pinch run for by Shunsuke but it didn't make any difference. Komiyama struck out swinging and Iwata grounded out. In Giants seventh Chono grounded out but Abe hit into centre. Would Giants exploit the situation? Ramirez hit deep and far but Shibata who is very secure near the wall took a nice catch and then Tani grounded out to short to end the chance. Tigers eighth also saw the batters fall in order with Toritani falling to a sharp liner to Sakamoto but you began to wonder how long Utsumi could continue. Giants eighth was also quiet, once again the batters being unable to cope with Iwata. Tigers ninth was were things went wrong - the batters should have made Utsumi work more but were too keen to swing away. Partially it was understandable, one good swing would have been enough but it made things easy for Utsumi. First Arai and then Brazell struck out swinging and then Murton grounded out to second - this practically ended his run of consecutive games. Giants girded themselves for one final effort in their ninth and Sakamoto led off with a hit. He was bunted to second by Terauchi but then Iwata produced a great pitch out of the hat to dismiss Chono looking. There was still Abe to go and he hit his first pitch to second where Hirano ensured the ground out to end the innings.

The game had so far taken less than two and a half hours and so there was every chance of it finishing before 9 pm. But Mayumi's incompetence ensured that it would finish badly for the Tigers. Utsumi returned for Tigers tenth and got Shunsuke to ground out. Then Komiyama was pinch hit for by Uemoto. Quite apart from the fact that Mayumi was pulling a good catcher for a poor one what was he doing using Uemoto as a pinch hitter in that situation? Uemoto flew out to centre after three pitches - he didn't even work the batter. Then we saw Fujii pinch hitting for Iwata. This was just plain absurd. Even though it was the right decision to pull Iwata (who had thrown 102 pitches) it was a stupid move to use Fujii as a pinch hitter. He's barely an effective regular team hitter as it is. Fujii hit his second pitch to second and a chance to work and tire Utsumi had been lost. Utsumi had thrown 147 pitches by now and was tiring. So we had an inadequate catcher calling for Giants tenth and any forebodings of disaster were soon to be realised. The pitcher for the 10th was Fukuhara. He faced Ramirez who hit to centre and was pinch run for by Suzuki. Tani bunted Suzuki to second. This was almost a disaster but Giants got away with it as Fujii's calling was inept to say the least. However, at this stage Mayumi panicked and replaced his experienced pitcher with an inexperienced pitcher with a tendency to blow it in clutch situations - Enokida. Enokida started well though striking out Tsuruoka. Then he faced Yano who Fujii decided to walk on the grounds that the next batter would be Utsumi. Somehow it was missed that Hara might actually send in a pinch hitter for Utsumi at this stage. This is exactly what Hara did and Takahashi walked to the plate with runners on first and second. Takahashi took two strikes and a ball and was feeling the stress but for his fourth pitch got a 128 kph cutball inside. This was the wrong pitch and a poor call and Takashi walloped it over the fence for a three run home run 4-1 Giants sayonara victory.

Tigers had fought hard to a certain degree but had been let down by their manager and coaches. It should have been obvious that Hara would have used a pinch hitter to go for victory and walking Yano was the height of folly. The only good thing to take away from this game is that Mayumi is now nearer dismissal. Hopefully, Tigers can then find a real manager and bring out the talent this team has.