July 13th Akiyama v Fujii - Wada blows it

After having set up a nicely balanced winning team Wada had to play with the lineup and bring in his useless crony Takayama in place of Imanari. Imanari has been developing nicely as a right fielder and playing well. There was certainly no need to switch him for Takayama. The sheer lack of necessity of the move stood out like a sore thumb. Wada also saw the need to replace Saka with Ryota - I quite like Ryota but Saka is the man in form and so with two hot batters being replaced is it any wonder Tigers couldn't hit? Amateur idiocy like this gets management a bad name - why change a winning team. We also saw Shimizu replace Fujii as catcher - Komiyama would have been better and in fact the latter did make a very good appearance later in the game. Scores

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

Starting Lineups

BayStars
1. Ishikawa (Second)
2. Yamazaki (Short)
3. Morgan (Centre)
4. Blanco (First)
5. Nakamura (Third)
6. Kinjoh (Right)
7. Shimozono (Left)
8. Tsuruoka (Catcher)
9. Fujii (Pitcher)

Tigers
1. Nishioka (Second)
2. Yamato (Centre)
3. Toritani (Short)
4. Murton (Left)
5. Takahiro Arai (First)
6. Takayama (Right)
7. Ryota Arai (Third)
8. Shimizu (Catcher)
9. Akiyama (Pitcher)

How Wada can consider Shimizu a starting catcher ahead of Komiyama is beyond rational analysis but he would do OK until the fourth when he and Akiyama both fell apart. Tigers really should have made more of the lamentable Fujii but the changes to the lineup rather stripped out the batting support for Murton and Arai. Akiyama would start well retiring the BayStars better in order. Given his start it is a wonder why he deteriorated and the answer must be nerves and Shimizu. Yamato singled with one out in Tigers first and then tried to steal second. He was thrown out. Toritani walked and then also tried to steal second to be thrown out as well. An inept first to say the least. BayStars first hit came in their second - a two out single to centre from Kinjoh but Shimozono grounded out and that was the end of the innings. Murton who had had his at bat interrupted in the previous innings led off Tigers second with a single left. Arai grounded out to short but that did take Murton to second but the worthless Takayama struck out swinging and Ryota grounded out weakly to the pitcher. BayStars third was quiet with the batters falling in order. One hit over three innings wasn't an indication of what was to come. Shimizu led off Tigers third with a single to left. Akiyama was instructed to bunt and failed miserably being out with the three failed bunts. Nishioka flew out but Yamato singled to centre again. This put runners on first and second with the next batter Toritani. As so often in these situation he failed and struck out swinging. Tigers had failed to exploit their chances early in the game.

Akiyama received a tongue lashing for his failed bunt - big deal - it's a bunt and this also may have affected his pitching. Ryota's fielding was not of the best and after a long battle Yamazaki hit through the Tigers third who should have done better - runner on second. Then Morgan dug one out and hit right for a timely double 1-0 BayStars, runner on second. Here Shimizu should have steadied his pitcher but he was incapable of doing this. Blanco singled left bringing in the next run 2-0 BayStars, runner on first and then Nakamura walked - all with no outs. It would have been a good idea to replace the pitcher at this stage before the damage got done but Wada did nothing. Kinjoh was next and really what happened next should never have happened. Kinjoh is a has been batter who should normally be an easy out but Akiyama was pitching so poorly that Kinjoh hit hard and far for a three run home run 5-0 BayStars. Shimozono struck out and finally Tigers had their first out in the innings. Then Tsuruoka flew out to centre - two outs and Fujii struck out looking to end the innings. For sheer economy of hits BayStars had done very well - five runs off four hits. None of this machine gun rubbish but power hits which had put them in a commanding position. Tigers were shellshocked and unable to mount a counter attack. All their good effort against Fujii in the first three innings had disappeared and the batters in the fourth fell in order. Wada had Akiyama pitch the BayStars fifth and he did better this innings retiring the batters in order. Of course, having a five run cushion means you can cruise a bit and there was certainly an element of this in BayStars batting now. Tigers fifth was quiet with the final out being Komiyama who was unlucky breaking his bat as he swung. Boyer took over for BayStars sixth and pitching to Komiyama rapidly retired the batters in order. It was a nice quick innings. Fujii did the same in Tigers sixth - the Tigers had had the stuffing knocked out of them and were a bit clueless about what to do.

Boyer also pitched BayStars seventh and once again retired the batters in order. It was a good two innings. Tigers seventh was also quiet with the final out being Takayama who saw his last at bat. As a player he had been a conspicuous failure and what Wada thought in putting him in was anyone's guess. He would be replaced by Shunsuke but the logical replacement was Imanari and more of that later. Matsuda pitched BayStars eighth for his first team debut. He started well strking out Ishikawa and getting Yamazaki to fly out in foul ground to Ryota. Then Morgan singled and was pinch run for by Aranami. Aranami tried to steal second but lost the contest with Komiyama's arm and was out. Tigers managed to blow their eighth against a tiring Fujii. With one out Shunsuke singled. Sekimoto (pinch hitter) walked to set up runners on first and second. Nishioka flew out to right and Shunsuke tagged up and took third. Yamato though flew out to centre to end the innings. Having pinch hit Komiyama Wada in his stupidity replaced him with Imanari as catcher. Imanari really is Tigers worse catcher - even more ineffective than Okazaki. Blanco was the batter and Watanbe the pitcher. The result a solo home run to lead off BayStars ninth 6-0 BayStars. The next three batters fell in order but that home run was unnecessary. Tigers ninth and the Fujii was going for his first complete game shutout since 2002. This is an indication of how badly Tigers had played and how badly Wada had screwed up. The Tigers clean up fell in order having given up and with only Arai manifesting any resistance. BayStars victory.

Fujii had not been dominant but had done enough. Poor batting by Tigers but really poor manangement decisions by Wada had been the cause of the defeat. The idiocy of replacing two performing players with two non performing players and then not playing your best catcher had been shown up most clearly. The thing was the BayStars were there for the taking and with Komiyama as starting catcher probably Tigers would have won. Why Wada persists in playing Takayama is a mystery. He adds nothing to the side and is not the player a rational manager would use to replace a hot Imanari. The Giants also lost so the margin did not increase but Tigers cannot afford any more of Wada's flights of fancy.