This was a must-win game, given that the Giants had the night off… and Joe Gunkel was up to the task of leading the team to victory. He scattered six hits over his seven innings of shutout ball, walking none and striking out five. Meanwhile, the top of the order put up points every time…
It’s not like the Tigers did not get on base enough tonight. They just could not stay on the bases long enough to reach home, for the most part. Two runners got thrown out trying to advance a base too many, and two more got gunned down trying to steal second. The result is that…
Today was a showdown of two pitchers who recently were named to the Japanese Olympic baseball team: Koyo Aoyagi and Yudai Ohno. One has gotten very little recognition despite a fairly solid couple of years. The other won the Eiji Sawamura Award last season. It didn’t matter, though, as our guys pieced together a nice…
Takumi Akiyama put his best foot forward, but one bad pitch cost him in the sixth. Teruaki Sato continues to wow the nation, getting multiple hits, including another home run (tying him for second-highest rookie total in team history with Akinobu Okada). The rest of the team? Well, they created a few good scoring chances,…
Masashi Itoh has been a pleasant surprise as a rookie pitcher, but other teams have made him pay for his mistakes. Today was no exception, as two Giants hitters took him deep. A third took Shintaro Fujinami to dead center. Teruaki Sato’s completion of home runs against every other CL team in his rookie year?…
The Tigers had a seven-game lead over the Giants heading into this weekend tilt. They put seven runs up on the scoreboard in the first one-third of the game, pushing their winning streak to seven and shoving the Giants down into third place. But we all know that there is still plenty of season left,…
Hosts T-Ray, JD and Sanjay discuss the latest team news and recap the past 11 games of Tigers baseball. Now, let’s face it, there are only two other CL teams that have a shot at the pennant this year: the Swallows (!) and the Giants. We take some time to break them down and talk…
What can you say about these Hanshin TIgers? I can say that the bullpen took a real beating these past 18 games. I can also say that the bats came through a ton against some really good pitchers. Today made that evident beyond any other game in interleague play. Ace rookie Takahisa Hayakawa lasted just…
I’ll be honest with you. I predicted the Tigers would go 1-2 against the Buffaloes and they did. I predicted they would go 1-2 against the Hawks and they did. I predicted they would sweep the Fighters and they did. So a part of me was hoping to be right about a 1-2 finish against…
For just the second time in 2021 (I think), the Hanshin Tigers game was not on network TV in Kansai. As a result, I have very little to say about this game except that Koyo Aoyagi pitched a gem, allowing just one earned run in eight innings, and Jefry Marte hit the go-ahead two-run home…