October 1st Akiyama v Soriano - Dragons take the pennant

When Tigers needed a good performance they faced a pitcher that they had never faced before. They did what they usually do - froze and didn't hit. It wasn't that Soriano is a wonderful pitcher, he wasn't but he was OK. Tigers batters though cannot respond without previous experience and so Soriano picked up a complete game shutout. This doomed Tigers pennant hopes - they can no longer win and even if Dragons lose and the final games are tied Dragons win because they won the head to head series. The adequate response to this debacle would be to get rid of the dead wood at the top and hire a real manager but this is not likely to happen. Mayumi did comment on how his dream had been shattered but it was his own fault. I thought it might be instructive to look at an aspect of the game which shows the lack of management ability - that of catching.
Our current catcher Johjima whilst being brilliant is also limited when his pitchers get into trouble. He doesn't seem to be able to pull them out of their problems and often seems to be too one track. This is a legacy of the Pacific League I suppose. I had originally thought that Kanoh could learn from Johjima and indeed he can but I realised that Johjima had a lot to learn from Kanoh - particularly with creativity in calling. When Kanoh started calling it was mentioned that pitchers couldn't understand his calls primarily because he was creative and unorthodox. However, last year by following his direction struggling pitchers were able to perform well where with the more conventional Yano they were in trouble. Both Shimoyanagi (despite his preference for Yano) and Andoh benefited from Kanoh's approach. This is something that Kanoh could have taught Johjima if he had been backup catcher. The situation in the fourth innings would not have occurred. Johjima seemed genuinely unable to get Akiyama out of the mess whereas Kanoh had demonstrated an ability to walk a struggling pitcher through his session. However, Mayumi in his stupidity has condemned Kanoh to the outfield, not understanding the value that Kanoh brings to the catching equation. On the subject of Johjima there is also the question of his batting and why it has fallen off. Johjima at the beginning of the season scored left and left centre. Now his scoring hits are only to left. One has to wonder why this is. Is Johjima suffering from injury? At the initial rate he was on course for 100 RBIs but tailed off considerably and started focusing only on the left scoring hit. This conicided with the return of the useless Kanemoto and one wonders if the two events are linked. Has Johjima been asked to limit his hitting so as not to embarass Kanemoto? You cannot put this past the Tigers management who are weak when it comes to dealing with underperforming stars. Kanemoto is not performing well enough to be regularly included in the first team and neither are Saka or Shunsuke Fujikawa. These players are keeping more powerful batters out and their presence probably has cost Tigers the championship though admittedly there are other reasons. Scores

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

Starting lineup

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

Carp
1. Soyogi (Short)
2. Kimura (Second)
3. Amaya (Centre)
4. Kurihara (First)
5. Shima (Left)
6. Hirose (Right)
7. Kokubo (Third)
8. Ishihara (Catcher)
9. Soriano (Pitcher)

Tiges immediately set about wasting chances in the first innings. Murton drew a walk and then Hirano hit to left - runners on first and second. The next three batters did nothing though Arai did fall to a very nice catch by the centre. Soyogi led off Carp's first with a solo home run to left 1-0 Carp. Kimura walked as Akiyama struggled to establish his control. Kimura stole second but then Akiyama found his rythym getting the next three batters and striking out both Kurihara and Shima looking. Nice pitching. Kanemoto led off Tigers second with a hit and made second on a wild pitch. He got to third on Johjima's flyout and here a sacrifice fly would have been great but we had Shunsuke Fujikawa and a strike out instead. Next was Akiyama who grounded out to end the innings. Hirose led off Carp's second with a hit and got to second on Kokubo's ground out but then was out on Ishihara's short ground out. Soriano was the final batter and he struck out to end the innings. Hirano hit once again in Tigers third but then Toritani hit into a first double play to end the innings. Carp's third was just quiet with the batters falling in order.

Tigers fourth was also quiet and the match seemed evenly balanced. Kurihara led off Carp's fourth with a hit and then Shima hit. Akiyama had suddenly run into trouble and seemed ill equipped to deal with it. Hirose bunted to third and here things unraveled. Akiyama picked up and threw to Arai to get the runner going for third. Unfortunately his throw wasn't good and Arai couldn't take - the error was Akiyama's entirely and not Arai's. Kurihara had slid into third and was safe and taking advantage of the throw was able to make home 2-0 Carp runners on first and second. Kokubo was next and hit to right to load the bases. Johjima seemed to be unable to deal with this situation whilst Kanoh would have come up with something which saved Akiyama. Ishihara hit the ball into centre for a sacrifice fly, Shima beating the throw though Johjima blocked the plate well 3-0 Carp, runners on first and second. Soriano bunted after a battle in which Akiyama threw too many balls - two outs but runners on first and second. Next was Soyogi and the best tactics would have been to walk him and take Kimura as the final outs. Instead a nervous Akiyama tried to pitch to him and gave up a hit to right - both runners were home 5-0 Carp with Soyogi on second. This became Soyogi on third as he successfully stole the base - Johjima's throwing was poor this game. Kimura struck out looking and really Tigers only had themselves to blame for the mess they found themselves in. In fact they wasted another chance when with two out Sakurai (pinch hitter) hit to Kurihara who let the ball through his legs into left field. However, they didn't take advantage of this error and Murton grounded out to second. Kurihara hit in Carp's fifth but then Shima reverting to normal hit into a double play to end the innings. Hirano led off Tigers sixth with a hit - he at least hadn't given up. However, he was forced to watch as his compatriots failed to move him round at all. Fukuhara pitched Carp's sixth - always a risk but he retired the batters in order and there was no score. In fact once Akiyama was replaced Carp proved unable to do anything.

Tigers seventh was quiet with Kanemoto striking out looking to a nice piece of pitching and a piece of lackadaisical batting by him. Soyogi hit to right in Carp's seventh and stole second the throw from Johjima being particularly abysmal. He made third on Kimura's ground out but then Maru (replacement centre) flew out to short and nothing came of this. In Tigers eighth Soriano walked Hirano - the fourth pitch being high and near Hirano's head. Hirano had to fall back into the dirt to avoid it. Ishihara checked that Hirano was OK and then walked to the mound and tore a strip of Soriano telling him in no uncertain terms not to do that again. A very nice gesture but then Ishihara had not been involved in the earlier dead balling incidents. However, Toritani flew out to left to end the innings and the Tigers were not able to exploit the incident. Sugiyama pitched Carp's eighth and was as useless as ever but escaped without damage. He walked Kurihara and then gave up a hit to Shima to right. Kanoh was fielding right (can you believe it) and wasn't exactly good with the take. When will our manager understand that Kanoh's value to the side is as a catcher not an outfielder? Runners on first and second. Hirose hit into a double play which did take Kurihara to third though. Kokubo hit straight to third and the innings was over. So would Soriano get his complete game shutout. The answer was yes - the three batters he faced succumbed rather easily with Kanemoto striking out swinging to end the game. Carp victory.

Tigers had lacked application and in fact only Hirano had shown any application with the bat. Mayumi had held a team talk in the middle of the game which had made no difference. Tigers dropped back to third behind the Giants and lost the chance of winning the pennant. I did predict that they wouldn't do it but I hadn't expected them to blow it so quickly. Kanemoto is currently a waste of space and should never have been put into the five slot - this is folly of the first order. The counters didn't move as neither Toritani or Murton hit anything.