The first inning of this one was extremely promising. Yuki Nishi needed just nine pitches to mow down the Dragons’ first three batters, while Ogasawara spent more than that on Koji Chikamoto alone, who got a hit out of the battle. Jefry Marte pulled the same stunt, and the Tigers had an early lead. Unfortunately,…
Takumi Akiyama had much to atone for after his last outing, a disastrous one against the Giants. For the game’s first seven innings, he did just that. And the bats sprayed a bunch of singles and watched a lot of bad pitches by Aren Kuri, which enabled them to piece together a bunch of early…
Coming into this game, it had been a full 27 innings (three games) since the Tigers had recorded an RBI hit. Wednesday’s loss saw them score their lone run on a sacrifice fly, and the game before, it was Teruaki Sato’s home run. On Sunday, their seven runs came on: a two-run homer, a wild…
If Friday’s loss left a bad taste in the mouth of Tigers’ fans, you’d better believe it did the same to the Tigers’ players. And they made the Baystars pitchers in particular pay the price. This one was a no-doubter from the onset, and though I was in attendance, I missed the first inning, which…
Though the Tigers were riding a 7-game winning streak heading into this one, the Giants were also on a 6-game tear of their own. Without some of their recovering Covid-infected players (Maru, Nakajima, Wheeler, Wakabayashi). Plus, there were rumors that Eric Thames and Justin Smoak could be activated for this series. No worries, though. Our…
The summer uniforms came out in all their glory tonight. You know the ones. They would look great on Osakan old ladies, but what are they doing on your favorite ballplayers? Never mind that. Shintaro Fujinami went 5+ innings of shutout ball, fanning six and getting key outs when he needed them, and he also…
The first two games of this series were simply too good to be true. Our hitters were mercilessly pounding the Giants pitchers, and our pitchers were holding off their big bats. In this one, the tides turned, though our pitching was still quite strong. But those bats… most of the game looked like fielding practice…
Last season, the Tigers not only started the year 2-10, they also dropped their first three against the Yomiuri Giants. Two of them were not even close. Enter 2021, and the Giants not only have Sugano on the DL, but they have used Togo over the weekend and also got hit with a Covid cluster,…
We saved our best pitcher, Yuki Nishi, for today because he pitches well against the Carp, especially in Hiroshima. He did not disappoint. Unfortunately, their pitcher (Masato Morishita) also pitches well against us, regardless of the ballpark. The result is a regrettable loss by the slimmest of margins.
After a rollercoaster of a ride on Opening Day, the Tigers settled down nicely to finish off the Yakult Swallows on the weekend. This contrasts nicely with last season’s opening weekend sweep at the hands of the Giants. The power on display at Meiji Jingu Stadium sure gave fans a lot to get excited about!…