August 29th - Saved by the rain

It does take Wada a long time to learn things. He started Tsuruoka who was abysmal from the seventh onwards and really started to disintegrate. Luckily for Tigers Swallows starter was Akagawa who was not ready and was known not to be ready. It was amazing that he actually started the game at all given this situation. He gave up seven runs before being replaced in the fourth but Tigers raced to a 10 run lead. Then Tsuruoka set about squandering that lead from the seventh. Swallows picked up five runs and if rain hadn't intervened in the ninth (with a bases loaded no out situation) then might have snatched the game. Nohmi did well enough to get the win and Kanoh returned at right and was impressive driving in four runs. However, if the Swallows starter had been a bit more competent Tigers would have lost this game.