August 17th Tsuru v Ogawa - Grinding the Swallows down

Tigers took a leaf out of their opponents book and introduced a pitcher that the Swallows were unfamiliar with - Tsuru. It worked rather well and in a tight game Tsuru produced seven competent innings. The only run of the game came from the bat of Murton and even though I am critical of him he does well occasionally. It is just that he doesn't do well enough to hold the No. 4 slot and whilst he is better than Kanemoto in his dotage Murton should bat in a different postion. Scores

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

Starting Lineups

Swallows
1. Hiyane (Left)
2. Ueda (Centre)
3. Kawabata (Third)
4. Balentien (Right)
5. Hatakeyama (First)
6. Morioka (Short)
7. Yamada (Second)
8. Nakamura (Catcher)
9. Ogawa (Pitcher)

Tigers
1. Nishioka (Second)
2. Yamato (Centre)
3. Toritani (Short)
4. Murton (Left)
5. Takahiro Arai (First)
6. Fukudome (Right)
7. Saka (Third)
8. Fujii (Catcher)
9. Tsuru (Pitcher)

The big question was how Tsuru would do as Tigers pitchers often struggle outside the cocoon of their safe assigned roles. His start was very encouraging though - three Swallows potted and shot out of the sky. Ogawa ran into trouble with his first pitch of the game. Nishioka drove comfortably into centre for a single. He was bunted to second by Yamato and then Toritani struck out. Things were heading for a quiet innings when to everyone's delight and surprise Murton hit hard right into the corner to bring in Nishioka 1-0 Tigers, runner on second. That was the end of the scoring for the whole game though. Arai hit back to Ogawa for the final out. Swallows second saw their first base runner - Hatakeyama escaping the net and walking. With only one out Swallows had a chance to make something of it but couldn't. Morioka grounded out to second forcing out Hatakeyama but making first safely himself and Aikawa flew out to left. Ogawa shook himself down and was able to retire the Tigers batters in order in their second. Swallows third started with an out but then Ogawa doubled. This was a complete surprise to everyone (Ogawa included) and suggested the Tsuru will still need more work before he can be a reliable starter. It was dangerous because there were still two outs to go but they couldn't convert and both batters contrived to fly out ending the danger. Tigers third saw Yamato single left with two out but Toritani couldn't do anything and the innings was scoreless.

Kawabata led off Swallows fourth with a deft single to short but then Balentien was a bit to eager to hit and went for his first pitch. This ended up in the glove of Toritani creating a straight forward double play. Hatakeyama then grounded out to second and that was that. Murton round for his second go singled. Arai walked and Tigers had runners on first and second with no outs. They blew it Fukudome, Saka and Fujii all struck out swinging in what was an impressive recovery by the Swallows pitcher. With two out in Swallows fifth Nakamura singled to short again - Toritani was certainly fielding well and managing to stop all sorts of things but not being able to get the throws away. This time Ogawa grounded out for the final out of the innings. Tigers fifth saw nothing happen. The pattern of the game was resolving itself into a series of isolated hits for Swallows where the Tigers had managed to cluster two of theirs. Swallows sixth was quiet and no one reached base. Toritani who had had a quiet game so far led Tigers sixth off with a walk. No one managed to move him off base and the score remained the same.

With Tsuru beginning to tire Balentien led the Swallows seventh off with a double which was put over Yamato at centre. This was a real opportunity but Swallows batters were a bit too keen to have a go. Hatakeyama mistimed his first pitch and flew out to second and then Morioka hit his first pitch to second. This did take Balentien to third but Tsuru kept his nerve and got Yamada to also mistime his swing and pop up to short ending the danger and the innings. Tigers seventh was quiet and no one reached base. Wada didn't attempt to pitch Tsuru into the eighth. He had done well and had kept the Swallows off the scoreboard all on 96 pitches with one walk and four hits (even though two had been extra base hits). Matsuda took over and with one out gave up a single to Tanaka (pinch hitter). He was forced out as Hiyane grounded out to third but the double play didn't come off. However, Hiyane tried to steal second but was thrown out to end the innings. Tigers eighth was pitched by Yamamoto. Yamamoto started well and struck out Nishioka. Then Yamato singled to short. Neither Toritani nor Murton could do anything and the innings ended scoreless. Fukuhara pitched Swallows ninth and had no issues retiring the batters in order finishing with Balentien grounding out to short and ending the game. Tigers victory.

It had been tight and hard fought. Tigers defense had been good and they had kept the Swallows from clustering their hits. It had been a good performance by Tsuru and Wada had resisted the temptation to push him an innings too far. With this victory Tigers ensured that the Kyocera Dome series would end up at least 50/50 in wins losses and one can say that so far their shi no rodo has been an excellent performance by the team.