July 20th Iwata v Kenta Maeda - Maeda has a good day

Having no chance of winning the Central League Carp reverted to type, generating lucky scrappy victories when they can. Admittedly they had a very fine performance from Maeda but some lucky hits which went there way and a very bad mistake by the plate umpire were also significant. Plate umpires do need to apply more attention to the actual rules of baseball - a runner going for home should be physically tagged out if not forced out. As Jim Allen noted in the Hot Corner too many times possession of the ball is often considered enough. It also seems that waving the ball in the direction of the player is also acceptable. A scrupulous adherence to and knowledge of the laws of the game is needed from NPB umpires and we aren't really getting this. Scores

        1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R  H E
Tigers  0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1  6 0
Carp    0 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 X 3 10 0

Starting lineups

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

Carp
1. Akamatsu (Centre)
2. Kimura (Short)
3. Maru (Left)
4. Kurihara (First)
5. Ueno (Right)
6. Kokubo (Third)
7. Yamamoto (Second)
8. Ishihara (Catcher)
9. Kenta Maeda (PItcher)

Maeda considering what he did later started very poorly. Murton led the Tigers first off with a hit. Then Hirano took a dead ball - the Carp seem to have a liking for dead balling him for some reason. Runners on first and second with no outs. This woke Maeda up and he got Toritani to ground out to third forcing out Murton. Then Arai struck out and Brazell flew out. Akamatsu led off the Carp's first with a hit but two outs later tried to steal second and was thrown out to end the innings. Tigers second was quiet - it was obviously going to be a difficult night. At this stage Iwata was matching Maeda, in fact he had had the slightly better start and in Carp's second he struck out two. He led Tigers third off by striking out but then Murton hit to centre. Hirano was out but Murton made second and then Toritani walked. Arai grounded out to third - poor shot selection here. Yamamoto led off Carp's third with a single and made second on Ishihara's ground out. Then Maeda hit at Iwata and was able to get on base safely with Yamamoto on third. Akamatsu hit a grounder to short and Yamamoto went for home. Toritani though threw safely to Fujii for the out. There were runners on first and second though but the last batter was Kimura who flew out to Toritani to end the innings.

Sekimoto managed a one out hit in Tigers fourth but got no further than first. Maeda was beginning to establish control. Kurihara also had a one out hit in Carp's fourth but then Ioh (replacement right) hit into a double play to end the innings. Tigers fifth was quiet with no one getting on base. Carp's first started with a hit - Kokubo hitting to centre. Then Yamamoto tried a bunt which worked out better than expected and became a bunt hit - runners on first and second with no outs. Ishihara grounded out to first which forced out Yamamoto - Tigers fielders were doing a good job keeping the runners away from third. Maeda tried to bunt but failed in his three attempts and was out. Finally Akamatsu grounded out to short to end the innings. Carp had blown a good chance. Tigers sixth and with one out Arai hit to left. Brazell hit a big two base to right centre and Arai charged home 1-0 Tigers, runner on second. Then Sekimoto his first pitch to right centre. It stayed up and Brazell hesitated to see if it was OK then set off. He isn't the fastest but the throw wasn't that good and he was able to evade the tag and reach home. However, the plate umpire decided that the tag had been made against all evidence to the contrary. Brazell was furious and had to be restrained by Kanemoto. Brazell does seem to attract these incidents - there was the one at Koshien but whilst that was because the umpire was genuinely unsighted. Here the umpire had no excuse. It was a poor piece of work and indicative of the poor standards of Japanese umpiring in general. Ishihara makes a habit of claiming tags he doesn't make and umpires need to take this into account. Sekimoto took advantage of the situation to reach third but Mayumi flew out to short. Carp had escaped their just deserts. Iwata then held the lead very nicely in the sixth and retired the Carp batters in order.

Tigers seventh was importantly quiet - a vital innings by Maeda who kept the Tigers batters off base. Iwata didn't start the Carp's seventh well. Ioh led off with a single to left. Kokubo bunted him to second and then Yamamoto grounded out to Iwata but did crucially move Nakahigashide (pinch running for Ioh) round to third. Next was Ishihara who swung and hit towards Toritani. He could only stop the ball and the runner was home 1-1 scores tied, runner on first. Maeda struck out to end the innings. Tigers eighth was quiet - they needed to up the ante and strike back but couldn't get past Maeda. Iwata returned for Carp's eighth which seemed a logical move - he had only thrown 89 pitches but from what happened it might be an idea to think about the psychological effects on the pitchers. Iwata pitched nervously and the Carp took full advantage. Akamatsu led off with their first extra base hit of the game - a two base. Iwata lost it and walked Kimura. Here would have been a good time to replace him. Maru grounded out to first but moved the runners round to second and third. Then it was decided to deliberately walk Kurihara to load the bases for a double play. It didn't work out that way as Tomonori Maeda (pinch hitter) got a lucky impact which bounced in front of and then over Sekimoto at second for a right hit. Two runners home 3-1 Carp, runners on first and second. This prompted Mayumi to switch pitchers and Kobayashi took the mound. He got Kokubo to ground out to short moving Kurihara to third but then struck out Yamamoto to end the innings. Ah well, these things happen. Tigers ninth and the pitcher was Sarfate whom Tigers have had trouble figuring out. Things hadn't changed and the batters fell in order. Carp victory.

This was disappointing in that the victory would have put Tigers at .500 for the first time this year. However, they are actually now joint second with the Dragons which is rather surprising. The nine games in a row series had actually gone rather well with 5 wins and 3 losses and one game rained off. Tigers would have probably won the rained off game as well as the Carp were not really strong opposition. Actually, this game would have probably gone Tigers way but for the umpiring failure.