September 13th Standridge v Chen - Unlucky for Tigers

First the sad news that the ex-owner of Tigers, Kuma-san died yesterday at the age of 90. He was instrumental in bringing Hoshino to Tigers in 2002 and in opposing the merger of the two leagues. He resigned from the post of owner to take responsibility for illegal payments to a high school pitcher, Itchiba (who eventually joined Rakuten and faded away). In other news Shimoyanagi is not going to get another first team start this year and this is likely his last year with Tigers. One has to accept that this is about time as age has caught up with him.
As for the game Tigers were unlucky in the extreme but also pretty inept. All of Dragons wild shots stayed in and despite some abysmal pitching from Chen Tigers were unable to get beyond parity. All in all an unsatisfactory day. Standridge hasn't won for several starts now and one has to ask whether this is a confidence thing or a result of the over-pitching earlier in the season? Of course being paired with Fujii doesn't help - he had another poor game behind the plate but this time stayed in the whole game. More bad news is that our front office is leaning towards keeping Mayumi on for the next season even if he doesn't make the Climax series. One wonders what he has to do before these morons will dismiss him and replace him with someone who can manage. Mayumi has given ample evidence of his unsuitability for the job, inability to handle pitching, bringing in non-entities to fill key positions, total lack of motivational skills, the list is endless. Scores

         1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R  H E
Dragons  2 0 1 2 1 0 0 0 0 6  9 0
Tigers   2 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 4 12 0

Starting lineups

Dragons
1. Araki (Short)
2. Ibata (Second)
3. Morino (Third)
4. Blanco (First)
5. Wada (Left)
6. Tanashige (Catcher)
7. T. Donoue (Right)
8. Ohshima (Centre)
9. Chen (Pitcher)

Tigers
1. Hirano (Centre)
2. Yamato (Third)
3. Toritani (Short)
4. Arai (First)
5. Murton (Right)
6. Kanoh (Left)
7. Nohmi (Second)
8. Fujii (Catcher)
9. Standridge (Pitcher)

Nohmi was replaced by Uemoto before the game started.

Tigers have taken up the practice of concealing a particular fielder by naming a pitcher in the position again. This is more a measure of how desperate they are as the practice itself is of questionable value. Standridge didn't start well and Araki led off Dragons first with a neat hit to left. He was bunted to second by Ibata and Morino came to the plate. Nothing was expected but he turned his third pitch along the first baseline where it landed literally a centimetre or two inside the foul line on the wall in the corner. A very lucky hit and a two base at that. Araki was home 1-0 Dragons, runner on second. Blanco struck out swinging and then Wada walked. Standridge wasn't pitching well at all and this has been the story of his most recent starts. Tanishige followed and hit into left where Kanoh took the ball and threw rather languidly to Fujii. Morino was home 2-0 Dragons with Wada making third and Tanishige safe on first. Donoue hit to first and Arai took a fine catch to end the innings. Fortunately, for Tigers if Standridge was bad so was Chen. He didn't look comfortable at all and with one out walked Yamato. Yamato stole second successfully and then Toritani walked. Runners on first and second. Arai hit straight beating Chen's glove and bringing home Yamato 2-1 Dragons, runners on first and second. Next was Murton who hit his first pitch to right. It wasn't very deep but was deep enough and Toritani should have made home. Instead he stopped on third and the bases were loaded. Another retrograde step in Tigers play seems to be the holding up of base runners on third and the spurning of scoring chances. Kanoh followed and grounded out to short who threw to second for the force out. Kanoh though outran the throw to first and was safe. Toritani was home 2-2 scores tied, runners on first and third. The final batter was Uemoto who struck out swinging to end the innings. Standridge seemed to have settled in Dragons second and retired the batters in order. Chen was not so comfortable, in fact he was sweating like a pig throughout his session and walked Standridge in four. This was just poor pitching - he couldn't find the zone. It brought Tanishige to the mound with some sharp words for his pitcher. This seemed to work as Hirano hit a grounder to Chen and then Yamato lined out. Standridge faced Ibata leading off the Dragons third and let fly a really poor pitch. It was fat, juicy and in the middle of the zone and it was what Fujii had called. One wonders why - Ibata latched onto it and hit along the third baseline where it just stayed in for a solo home run. Another lucky hit but they all count 3-2 Dragons. Morino and Blanco did nothing and then Wada hit to right. Murton ran in and with an excellent dive took a fine catch to end the innings. Tigers rather let Chen off the hook in their third. Toritani led off with a hit. Both Arai and Murton should have done better and both swung too soon. Arai flew out deep to centre and Murton hit into a double play, a very stupid shot.

Dragons fourth saw the end of Standridge. He hadn't been pitching at all well. He started the innings by dead balling Tanishige on the arm. Standridge argued the point though - he seemed to think that Tanishige had deliberately left his arm in the way. Whilst Tanishige is certainly capable of this kind of cheating it didn't look like that this time and looked rather like a genuine dead ball. Donoue banged out a two base which put runners on second and third with no outs. Things looked dangerous and if truth be told Standridge should have been pulled after the dead ball. Instead Ohshima was allowed to work the ball until he could guide it nicely into left for a timely hit 4-2 Dragons, runners on first and third. This brought the required change, Standridge was clearly incapable of continuing but Fujii stayed in this time. Watanabe took the mound and struck out Chen. Araki hit a grounder to third and Tigers were able to sandwich the runner and tag him out preventing the run. This could have been handled better though and Fujii screwed up here. Instead of pursuing the runner to third he threw too soon and pulled Yamato off third. Watanabe made the tag near home but the Dragons runners were able to take second and third. Still one out to get and this would have been Ibata. He hit to third. Yamato fielded but lost his footing as he did so and ended up on his but. He got up and made the throw but was too late and Ibata was safe. The Dragons had another run though 5-2 Dragons, runners on first and third. The official scorer somehow ruled this error a third base hit - the Koshien scorer is getting to be a joke, this was an error by Yamato and it wasn't marginal either. But Dragons looked to be running away with the game. Tigers fourth started quietly with Kanoh flying out to right. Uemoto walked in four as Chen's control problems reasserted themselves. Then surprisingly Fujii hit to centre, runners on first and second. Next was Asai (pinch hitter and replacement centre). He drove a two base almost lazily into the left corner bringing home Uemoto 5-3 Dragons, runners on second and third. Here things went wrong. Tigers had runners in scoring positions, a pitcher who was throwing rubbish and outs to play with. Hirano hit his first pitch straight back to Chen. Stupid batting when he could have waited. Yamato was better and hit into right bringing home a run 5-4 Dragons, runners on first and third. Here the decision to stop the runner on third was appropriate, Donoue was standing close in. This was the end of Chen and he was replaced by Kobayashi who made his entrance in one of the Tigers new SMART cars. He induced Toritani to fly out to centre to end the innings. Fukuhara pitched Dragons fifth and faced Blanco. Blanco whilst having a lot of power is having a dreadful season and swung wildly at a pitch. This one also flew along the third baseline and just stayed in - another lucky shot but a solo home run 6-4 Tigers. The next three batters were unable to do anything but Dragons still held the lead. Even so, given their performance earlier, Tigers had plenty of time to claw the difference back. Tigers fifth was pitched by Suzuki and with one out Murton hit to centre. Araki dived to take it and actually got his glove on it but the ball spilled out as he landed - it was a good try by the Dragons short. Kanemoto (pinch hitter) hit to right and Tigers had runners on first and second. Uemoto was pinch hit for by Lin (though I would have thought keeping Uemoto in was a good idea). Lin turned his first pitch nicely to right but unlike Morino's effort this was foul. Luck was not with the Tigers. His second pitch was hit to short for a liner. The last batter was Fujii and surely here a pinch hitter would have been a better idea. Fujii had had his shot for the game and wasn't going to get anymore. He grounded out to second to end the innings. Kojima pitched Dragons sixth and finished nicely striking out Araki. With one out in Tigers sixth Hirano hit into centre. In a move of studied stupidity Mayumi then had Yamato bunt him to second. Suzuki was replaced by Mise who immediately balked. This put Hirano on third but Mise then struck out Toritani swinging to end the innings.

Kojima pitched Dragons seventh as well and this innings was strange as Kojima struggled to respond to Fujii's erratic calling. Strike outs were interspersed with walks, three strke outs sandwiching two walks and by the end of the innings Kojima was ignoring the calls. Asao took over for Tigers seventh and faced Arai. Arai literally guided his shot along the first baseline showing all the skill of a master batter. He then raced round to second and as the ball came in dived head first for the sack. This was also deliberate as it threw up a cloud of dirt and helped obscure the tag. Now with Arai on second with no outs Tigers needed to convert. They failed and first Murton grounded out to short, a poor shot. Next we saw Shibata (pinch hitter) who was his usual abysmal self and flew out to left. Finally, Lin struck out swinging to end the innings. Tigers had wasted the chance but then it had been Asao pitching. Fujihara pitched Dragons eighth and retired the batters in order. He seemed to be comfortable this innings. In Tigers eighth Asai walked in four and once again it seemed like there was a chance. However, both Hirano and Yanato struck out swinging and the innings went nowhere. Araki struck out to lead off Dragons ninth but then Ibata hit to left. However, Morino couldn't do anything this time and hit into a double play. The pitcher for Tigers ninth was of course the fading Iwase but his decline is a slow thing and he is still a formidable opponent. He struck out Toritani but Arai hit to right. Murton forced Arai out and then Hiyama (pinch hitter) hit to left to set up runners on first and second. Maybe it would have been better to use Hiyama earlier in the game when there was a runner in a scoring position instead of Shibata. So two outs and Shunsuke (pinch hitter) next. He hit his first pitch straight to second to end the game. Dragons victory.

Tigers had outhit the Dragons significantly but scored two less runs. Certainly the Dragons had been lucky in their victory but one can't help feeling that the Tigers should have done better. Dragons coaches are better at getting the best out of their players than the Tigers coaches and it showed. Tigers stranded too many base runners and were profligate with their chances. They were also too liberal with their pitching and for this we have to cite Fujii. His patterns and calling are all too predictable and he needs to go as soon as possible. Unfortunately, he is probably settled in for the rest of the season.