Hawks Slug Out Series Win vs. Marines

People who had concerns about the SoftBank Hawks having trouble with offense, their fears were unfounded, especially if one looks at the offensive output the last 2 games of this series against the Chiba Lotte Marines at Chiba Marine Stadium.

After a 3-1 nail-biter in the first game of the series, long-banished Nagisa Arakaki made his return to the mound in game 2 against the Marines. It was not a grand return in the slightest. Shingo Ono also had a bit of trouble of his own, but the kind that Arakaki battled through was the worst kind: trouble that was caused by yourself.

With a 1-0 lead and on cruise control through the first 3 innings, Hayakawa led off the 4th inning with a grounder right back to Nagisa. However, Arakaki booted it, and the trouble began. The very next batter, Sunichi Nemoto, crushed his 3rd home run of the season on an errant pitch from Arakaki to put the Marines ahead, 2-1.

Kazuya Fukuura then singled back up the middle to put himself on 1st, then Saburo walked. The first out was finally recorded when Ohmatsu fouled out to the catcher Takaya, but the Marines came right back with singles from Imae and Hashimoto, the latter scoring another run to extend Lotte's lead to 3-1. With the bases still loaded, Benny Agbayani waked to force in another run to make it 4-1. Reserve shortstop Hayasaka, filling in for Nishioka who is in Beijing, grounded to 2nd for the 2nd out of the inning with a force at home. However, the 10th man to bat in the inning was once again Hayakawa, and he didn't waste any time. He drilled the straw that broke the camel's back: a manrui home run to right field and double Lotte's total to 8-1.

Despite all this, Arakaki got 6 innings under his belt, and it kept the Hawks from having to use too many bullpen pitchers. Arakaki's final line was 6 innings, giving up 8 runs (3 earned) on 5 hits, 2 walks, and 6 strikeouts.

Considering how well the Marines were hitting, it seemed almost expected that the bullpen would get roughed up as well, but the important thing was that the only two men who came out of the 'pen were Nitkowski and Kattoh. Nitkowski was roughed up by Lotte again, getting tagged with 2 earned runs after a walk and a hit. Keisuke Kattoh took over as Nitkowski was only able to get through 2/3 of an inning, and he was greeted with a 2-run home run by Ohmatsu to make it 10-4. Kattoh gave up 2 more runs to make it 12-4.

Offensively for the Hawks, their big inning was the 6th. Four straight hits from Kokubo, Matsuda, Ohmura, and Hasegawa scored 3 runs, 2 of them from Hasegawa's double to chase Shingo Ono, the Lotte starter.

The win went to Ono, who improved his record to 4-3. He gave up 4 runs on 8 hits, with 1 walk. Arakaki took the loss, he falls to 0-3. Three home runs where hit, all by the Marines: Hayakawa (4), Nemoto (3), and Ohmatsu (19). Yuichi Honda stole 2 more bases to raise his season total to 25.

The rubber game of the 3-game series was contested on the mound between Jeremy Powell and Yuki Karakawa. It was an ugly match on paper, as Karakawa had not started a game at ichi-gun since July 25th against these same Hawks, and Powell has been winless since April 15th.

The game started off fast, with the Hawks scoring 2 in the first thanks to singles from Honda, Akashi, and Matsunaka. The Marines countered with one run of their own with a double, a walk, and a groundout by Saburo scored Hayakawa to cut SoftBank's lead in half at 2-1. The very next inning, a double, a walk, and a single scored the equalizer at 2-2.

All was quiet until the 5th inning, when, after Takaya struck out to begin the inning, Honda singled, and Akashi walked to set up Matsunaka. He didn't waste any time as he rocked one of his patented right-field home runs to put the Hawks back ahead 5-2.

Though the Hawks were in good shape, the Marines would not go away. The 6th inning started with a single by Hashimoto. After a groundout by Takehara, Masato Watanabe pulled Lotte to within one with a towering home run to left field. Powell's day was done, and Takayuki Shinohara came in to stop the rally.

The Hawks veteran was able to do so in the 6th, but not the 7th. Fukuura led off the Marines Lucky 7 with a single, then after 2 outs were recorded, a double by Imae and a single by Hashimoto scored 2 more runs to put Lotte ahead for the first time in the game, 6-5.

The 8th inning started with the Hawks behind, but ended with them ahead thanks to a 5-run attack. Key points to the rally were an error on an attempted sacrifice bunt by Nao Ohmura, a bases-loaded walk, and a double by Honda. When the dust settled, the Hawks were up 10-6, which is how the game ended.

Makoto Satoh, who worked 2/3 of an inning to close the 7th inning, got the win to improve to 2-1 while Yusuke Kawasaki took the loss, getting tagged with four runs (one earned) on 2 hits, walking one. He did not record an out, and his record drops to 1-4.

Two home runs were hit today, one by Masato Watanabe, his first of the season, and Nobuhiko Matsunaka, his 22nd of the season. Yuichi Honda also stole his 26th base of the season, Nao Ohmura stole his 2nd, and Toshiaki Imae stole his 3rd base of the season.

The Hawks are 1.5 games ahead of the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters for 2nd place in the Pacific League, and are 6.5 behind the Saitama Seibu Lions for 1st. Ironically enough, the Fighters pay a weekend visit to Fukuoka Yahoo! Dome, with the first game being tomorrow at 6PM, JST.

Jason Standridge (0-1, 8.00) will make his first start with the top team since March 29th against the man who pitched the Fighters to the 2006 Pacific League crown, Tomoya Yagi (0-0, 0.00) in his first ichi-gun start of the season.