August 31st Nohmi v Bullington - Home again

Tigers duly celebrated their return to Koshien with a win in which Nohmi pitched superbly. Fujii also needed a good game after his disasters at Yokohama and this time he came through being almost impressive (he wasn't too wonderful in the ninth but escaped). Apparently, part of Tigers plans involves introducing Yano next year as a battery coach - something that has been severely lacking this year. Readers may remember that Yano's name has also been touted as a future kantoku of Tigers. Tigers are also going to make more use of Akahoshi but whether he will turn out to be a good coach remains to be seen. Scores

        1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R  H E
Carp    0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0  4 3
Tigers  1 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 X 3 11 1

Starting lineups

Carp
1. Akamatsu (Centre)
2. Kikuchi (Second)
3. Soyogi (Short)
4. Eldred (First)
5. Dobayashi (Third)
6. Mukae (Right)
7. Amaya (Left)
8. Kura (Catcher)
9. Bullington (Pitcher)

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

Still no place for Takahiro Arai and this is strange considering that Kanemoto is still playing. Even stranger is that Kanemoto bats ahead of Brazell in the lineup even though he has even less potential to drive in runs. One hopes he does the honourable thing and announces his retirement at the end of the season. Kokubo knew when to go but it seems Kanemoto doesn't. Nohmi would pitch superbly and coupled with some astute calling from Fujii would dominate proceedings. One of Carp's rare hits came in the first with a one out single to centre for Kikuchi. He made second on Soyogi's ground out but there was to be no repeat of Eldred's early home runs and he struck out swinging. Uemoto led off Tigers first with a single to Bullington who couldn't hold it. Yamato went to stupid bunt and it was fielded by Bullington who threw badly to second. Uemoto was able to take third with Yamato on second. Toritani then singled right to bring in the runner 1-0 Tigers, runners on first and second. Next was Ryota Arai who singled to third who also produced another error allowing Tigers to load the bases. Here things went drastically wrong as Tigers with a bases loaded no outs situation managed to score nothing. Kanemoto hit straight to Bullington - can't he get anything right? Bullington threw to home allowing Kura to tag out Yamato sliding in. Then Brazell struck out swinging and Hirano flew out to left. Still Tigers had managed to produce one run. Carp struggled in their second. Dobayashi was the only one who actually got momentum on the ball flying out to centre - the other two batters skied the ball into foul ground where both catches were taken. Fujii then led off Tigers second with a single. Nohmi bunted him to second but neither Uemoto nor Yamato possessed the wherewithall to move him further. The innings was scoreless. Nohmi remained in control for Carp's third and with the bottom two batters out of the way collected Akamatsu's return of his first pitch for the out. Tigers tried again in their third courtesy of another Carp fielding error. This one was by Soyogi and allowed the lead off batter Toritani to reach first. Kanemoto managed to walk in four as Bullington couldn't find the zone. Brazell hit deep to left flying out but moving Toritani to third. However, Hirano could only ground out to short and the innings was over.

So far so good - Carp had only managed one base runner and this continued in the fourth. No one could get on base and Nohmi continued to dominate. This time Tigers bottom of the order couldn't do anything in the fourth either. Carp's batters failed in the fifth with Amaya finishing the innings striking out looking. In Tigers fifth they produced another hit - this one a one out single to Toritani who stayed on first with no one moving him round and Kanemoto grounding out to first - one of his favourite outs. Carp then produced their only moment of danger for Nohmi in their sixth. With two out Nohmi issued his only walk of the game to Akamatsu. Kikuchi singled to centre off his first pitch but it was a shallow single and only put runners on first and second. This was not enough as Soyogi was caught swinging too soon and skying the ball to Ryota Arai at third. Brazell led off Tigers sixth with a single and was pinch run for by Saka. Then Hirano singled to set up runners on first and third. Fujii hit back to Bullington who threw to home to catch Saka coming in. Hirano took third and Fujii was safe on first. Nohmi went to bunt - it was unsure if this was one of Wada's beloved squeezes or an attempt to move Fujii to second. Anyway Bullington went high and wide and Nohmi went for it and missed - a strike. Kura also missed and the ball rolled away. Hirano seized his chance and scampered home; he was ruled to have stolen home but 2-0 Tigers. Nomura didn't agree and felt that Nohmi had fouled it. The argument continued for five minutes after which Nomura was ejected and the score stood. Nohmi then hit a grounder to third and then Uemoto flew out to end the innings.

Nohmi remained cool in Carp's seventh and retired the batters comfortably, Eldred striking out, Dobayashi flying out to right and Mukae going to centre. Yamato led off Tigers seventh with a single to centre. He then tried to steal second but was thrown out - if Akahoshi does join and can impart his stealing skills successfully, it will be really useful. Toritani flew out to his opposite number and Ryota Arai, who was having a quiet night, grounded out. Two outs down in Carp's eighth and Higashide singled right. Akamatsu grounded out in what would be Nohmi's last innings. One was a little surprised at this - good sense from Wada? Normally he would let his pitcher go for the complete game but stopping Nohmi at 112 pitches was very sensible. Nohmi had pitched superbly, three hits and one walk over eight innings. Kawauchi took over from Bullington for Tigers eighth. Bullington had also pitched well and had gotten out of some difficult situations. Kawauchi would not be so good. Kanemoto flew out to short. Wada sent Kanoh (pinch hitter) to the plate and he hit left for a solo home run 3-0 Tigers. Kanoh has been suffering from back problems and the issue of being converted into an outfielder - something he didn't want to do. He was actually contemplating retirement as were the Tigers but this may earn him a reprieve. Hirano struck out but Fujii singled again and this brought a pitching change with Yokoyama taking over. Sekimoto (pinch hitter) also singled and Tigers had runners on first and second. However, Uemoto grounded out to short to end the innings. With one innings to go Tigers were comfortably placed. Fujikawa pitched Carp's ninth and here Fujii did struggle. The first batter, Kikuchi walked in four. Soyogi flew out but Eldred singled to set up runners on first and second. Maeda (pinch hitter) grounded out to first which moved the runners round to second and third. But with two outs one thought that Carp weren't going to pull this one out of the fire. So it proved with Matsuyama (pinch hitter) flying out to right to end the game. Tigers victory.

Nohmi took the win and with Kanoh the hero interview. The game had been notable for some interesting errors and Hirano's run. Thanks to fine pitching by Nohmi Tigers had dominated and Nohmi picked up his seventh victory of the season. The save was Fujikawa's 21st. This month was better than July for Tigers but not by much with the final record being 9-15-3. Still August ended with the long suffering faithfull rewarded for their loyalty by a superb victory.