As I have much lamented lately, the Lotte offense is just plain injured. Tonight’s starting lineup featured two batters well below .200 BA (Matoba at .172, Okada at .184 – the backup catcher and 6th outfielder, respectively) and had two more pinch hitters below .200 (Takehara at .145, Muniz at .136). But looky here – tonight the offense still cranked out 8 hits en route to a nice 4-2 win, and a series victory over the visiting Eagles of Tohoku.

How’s that?

Modasho.

In other words, a “nice hitting game” – a game where a batter records 3 hits or more. There’s been quite a few of those lately – KTK had one the other day, and Imae had a 5-hit game yesterday, which is the purfied essence of modasho. But no, there’s one batter who’s been Mr Modasho – Tsuyoshi Nishioka. Just last night our all-star shortstop recorded his 21st modasho of the year, a new franchise record (a considerable achievement, since the franchise has been around 60 years). Tonight Tsuyoshi went 3-3 with a walk, a single up the middle, a double to lead off the game, and a 2-run HR to score the winning runs. Yep, it was his 22nd modasho of the year. The NPB record is held by none other than Ichiro in his legendary 1996 season – he had 26 that year. Unlikely that Captain Tsuyoshi will sniff that, but consider in the last 14 games he’s been hitting .415, scored 19 runs, and recorded 5 games of 3 hits or more. That’s a hot streak!

All that offense from the top spot went to support our ace, Naruse, in his 24th start of the year. In many ways Naruse has been his own worst enemy this year, giving up a stupefying 27 HRs but still keeping a 3.23 ERA and a great 1.01 WHIP. Somehow those nice stats have only lead to an 11-11 record – mystifying. Tonight Naruse was in great form – he gave up only 2 ER in a bit over 7 innings of work, but both of those runs came after he was well over 120 pitches on a hot, muggy evening – excusable, in other words. The young lefty went 139 pitches on the night with 7 Ks and only 8 baserunners.

The first run was a great bit of small ball. Tsuyoshi led off with a double, was sacrificed to 3rd by Kiyota (not that I am condoning bunting in the first with a man on second with one out, but complaining about it is like whining about the outfield seats being a bit noisy), and driven in by a slow bouncing grounder to short by Iguchi. Just like that, 1-0.

Okada singled to lead off the third against Rakuten’s Rasner. He swifty took second and scored on Tsuyoshi’s shot to left – a ball that ju-u-ust barely hooked inside the pole and over the fence, but good enough to count. 3-0 after 3.

Tae Kyun came up with one out in the 6th and just blasted a ball off of Rasner. It was high and very deep, almost straight back center, but it just clipped the top of the fence and stayed in for a double. That’s two nights in a row he’s barely missed one – maybe the power is back. Fukuura took care of Tae Kyun, driving him in with a nice single to center to make it 4-0.

As I mentioned Naruse was tiring pretty well by the 8th – he got in big trouble with a double just over Tsuyoshi’s head by Naoto Watanabe, a walk to Teppei, a balk, and another walk to Yamazaki. With that, Nishimura called in Ono for relief – Ono gave up two runs (charged to Naruse) but kept the lead at a manageable two runs. Kobayashi closed it out with a perfect 9th, and just like that, Lotte is a mere half game out of first!

Up next is the last series of the year with Nippon Ham. Our Marines have the chance to basically knock the Fighters out of a chance to get into the Climax Series with a good showing this weekend. The games have switched back to day games as it’s supposed to be cooler now that it’s September, but Saturday’s forecast calls for sunny and 36C/97F. I’ll be baking in the sun for both weekend games – the series starts tomorrow night with Yoshimi battling Nippon Ham’s Urufu. Wait, that’s supposed to be Wolfe.

So it’s just not possible to fix all of the world’s issues in a day. It’s not possible to right all of the wrongs in the Pacific League in a night either. But boy, Rakuten has sure been Kryptonite for our season and beating the stuffing out of them by the tune of 16-6 today sure feels good.

To get you up to speed: Most of Lotte’s problems with Rakuten is on the road. More specifically, Our Marines haven’t won a game in Sendai since before I began this blog. In fact, I was at the last Lotte victory in Sendai way-y-y back in 2008. Yeah, it’s been that long.

But more recently I sat through Tuesday’s debacle at Chiba Marine. It had all the makings of a great game – 11 game winner Bill Murphy vs perennial ace Hisashi Iwakuma. Murphy didn’t have much going for him on that night – getting beat up for 5 runs in 3 innings of work – and for all intents and purposes the game was over in an hour. What to do when you’re at the stadium for a game like this? Chat chat chat. I chatted with the chap in front of me (a driving instructor, he told Imae and Yabuta are basically my neighbors.). I cheered with the ladies next to me (they’ve been to almost as many games as I have.). In a way it’s more fun to be at a game where the drama is over early than a game where you’re losing but not enough to be a laugher. Who am I kidding, it’s not so much fun either way but you gotta make the most of what you got.

ANYWAY tonight’s game with Rakuten karmically fixed some of that. On the hill – Watanabe vs Nagai. Matoba still behind the plate, Okada in center, Kiyota in right, everybody else in their normal spots.

In the first Lotte scored a bizarre little unearned run. Tsuyoshi reached on an error, swiped second, was sacrificed to third by Kiyota, and scored on an Iguchi sac fly. Just your standard one-run first inning on no hits.

Happens every day

I told my friend that I would pay real money to see the game end like that.

But end like that it did not – in the bottom of the 3rd the Lotte attack sprung to life, crossing the plate 5 times on 4 hits, a walk, and another Rakuten error (as with the other error, by Ruiz at first). The big hits were Tae Kyun’s RBI single (GREAT to see him smashing the ball – 3-5 with 2 RBI and just barely missed a HR late in the game) and a 2-RBI double by Imae. Incidentally, Imae was an amazing 5-5 with a pair of doubles on the evening to raise his average to a lovely .324.

I had cheered before with the two rather drunk gentlemen next to me, but I didn’t realize how well they knew me. They called for a beer from a vendor I knew (who hadn’t seen me sitting there) and when she got to their seats I heard them say “Hey Kanako, Steve’s sitting next to us.” Maybe I am a minor celebrity in the A seats.

El Submarinero Watanabe was not on his game tonight, though. Right after our 3rd inning assault on Nagai’s stats, Shunsuke gave all 5 runs right back. Oh dear. I figured a 6 run lead would just be a nice cruise to the 9th inning but apparently not. 6-5 after the top of the 4th.

…But maybe it WILL be a nice cruise to the 9th after all! Matsuzaki replaced Nagai in the bottom of the 4th, and combined with more bad defense and a machine-gun assault by the Lotte bats Our Marines piled on 8 more runs in the bottom of the 4th – 18 runs combined by both teams in the span of an inning and a half! Everybody got into the act this time – Kiyota (3-4 with 2 RBI), Tsuyoshi (4-6 with 2 RBI), Ohmatsu (1-2 with an RBI in the 4th before getting pulled for Muniz), and even Matoba walked in a run. It was pure plate crossing goodness, and after the dust cleared and all the cheering ended, Lotte was up 14-5.

The benches emptied, and the rest of the game was like an exercise in Advanced Ouenkology – how many player songs do you know? Sure we all know the main stars, but how about Heiuchi’s new one? Muniz? (Of course, for both) How about Masato Watanabe’s? Hmm. When Masato filled in for Iguchi late in the game one of the gents next to me whipped out a Masato towel, probably the only one in the stadium, I would think.

Lotte tacked on two more runs (and Rakuten put up another) off a Muniz sac fly and a Fukuura HR to make the final 16-6. Now I feel much better about having sat through the loss on Tuesday! Combined with the Seibu win and Daiei loss the Marines are still in third but only 1 game out of first, half a game out of second. And on the really good news front, it seems that the teams below us are unable to make a move on the third spot – Orix and Nippon Ham are 4.5 back with less than 20 games left – so our spot in the climax series is looking increasingly secure.

The bad news is Karakawa is missing his planned start tonight due to elbow tightness, but it’s not supposed to be anything major. Naruse takes the hill instead, hopefully we can close out this series with another win!

27 August: Yoshihisa Naruse (LOT) vs Hiroki Yamada (DAI)
28 August: Yuji Yoshimi (LOT) vs Toshiya Sugiuchi (DAI)

And I tell you that Our Marines lost one of those games in disappointing fashion while giving the starter in the other game an epic thrashing – you’d surely say we won the first and lost the second, right? After all, Sugiuchi is one of the aces of the game and Yamada is, well, not. But that is exactly what happened on Friday and Saturday, as Lotte dropped the first game 4-2 (and Naruse took the loss) and cruised to a 9-6 victory over Sugiuchi and Daiei in Fukuoka. The rubber match on Sunday was a highly disappointing affair as Daiei beat out two runs off Hayden Penn and held on for the win. A 1-2 road trip, and just like that, back to third in the ultra-tight Pacific League race.

Naruse’s big problem on Friday was exactly what you would expect Naruse’s problem to be (based on this year) – a 2 out, 3 run HR in the first by Tamura. The other problem was also a bit predictable – only 4 hits to score those 2 runs.

The reason I say it’s predictable is that in essence the Lotte offensive 8 is without 4 starters right now – Ogino (Ta-Ka-Shi!) of course, and Satozaki has been down with back problems for most of the month. (Now, I like Matoba as a catcher. He seems like a calming influence on his pitchers and he calls a nice game. It’s no coincidence that the pitching has been solid since he’s been starting. But he has no bat at all.) Now Saburo is out for a bit as well with a hamstring injury (at least 10 days as he was de-registered from the ichi-gun roster) and Kim Tae Kyun continues to not produce runs (though he had the only RBI on Sunday and had RBIs via bases loaded walks twice this weekend, but no HRs, no clutch hits except for the one on Sunday).

Saturday’s game was a nice confluence of a total breakdown by Sugiuchi and great capitalization on that breakdown by the Men of Lotte. Three bases loaded walks, a sac fly, and a 3-run HR by Ohmatsu shoved Sugiuchi in an early 9-0 hole. Yoshimi pitched well, I thought (despite the 4 ER, 3 of which were on a HR) and Furuya + Yabuta were a wee bit shaky (ahem!) out of the pen, but it’s hard to blow a 9-run lead. The closer score at the end reflected just a bit of late inning drama, but not enough to make you worried.

If I were Hayden Penn I would be a bit frustrated after Sunday’s game. Matching up against the eminently hittable Ohtonari, Penn pitched rather well early in the game and well enough late to win, but he got no offensive support. Lotte had an early 1-0 lead thanks to the Tae Kyun RBI mentioned earlier, but the offense did little the rest of the way despite having men in scoring position with no or one out several times later in the game. Even Penn’s second run (of two earned) was a result of a mistake in defensive strategy – with a runner on third and nobody out in the fourth, Tsuyoshi fielded a hard-hit ball, checked the runner at third, and didn’t make the throw to first to prevent the runner from scoring. My feeling is especially in the first you take the possibility of the run scoring from third to get the out, as 1st-3rd-no outs is a pretty awful situation. Sure enough, both runners scored, and the second was the winning run.

Anyway, 1-2 isn’t so bad, and after this series Lotte is still just a single game out of first. Only 4 games left against Daiei (before the Climax Series, at least!) so Lotte must take care of business against Rakuten and Orix, especially (the two teams against whom we have the most games remaining). We can do it!

In a move that’s been a LONG time coming – we are back in first. Who’d a thought that a little ways back this month?

In a fortuitous confluence of events it was a) BlackBlack Towel Night (free towels, plus the team wore away blacks) b) Free Ticket Night from the Makuhari civic association c) The Baby-Faced Killer’s 3rd start since his return from broken bones. So I got a FREE towel at a a FREE game where my favorite pitcher was pitching against our biggest rival with the chance to climb into first. It was, in fact, a great night.

Because of how packed the stands were (amazing how many people turn up for a free ticket night, eh?) it took a while to settle into seats, and by the time we did Seibu had already taken a 1-0 lead thanks to a first inning Nakajima double to score Kataoka. Aaand… that was about it for the Lions attack. Well, that’s not entirely true – Seibu recorded 3 more hits including a double off the very top of the left-center fence by Takayama (I honestly thought it was gone off the bat, but the 7 m/s wind kept it in. Love the Tokyo Bay breeze!). But for all intents and purposes Seibu was shut down by Karakawa’s great movement and control.

Karakawa only allowed one baserunner (a walk) in the last 4 innings of work, and that was when he was already over 120 pitches. All in all the righty from Narita threw for 8 innings, with 7 Ks, only the one walk and the one run. It was exactly the strong start we needed.

The Lotte offense was somewhat befuddled by Seibu starter Nishiguchi with only one hit in the first 4 innings. In the 5th, though, Lotte would break through. After strikeouts by Matoba and Kiyota both Tsuyoshi and Imae singled, and ultra-hot Iguchi smacked an RBI single to tie the game at 1. Mega-slumping Kim Tae Kyun (0-3 with two awful-looking Ks) drew a walk to load the bases, but Fukuura’s fly ball hung up in right to end the inning.

Lotte loaded the bases again in the 6th with two outs, and Imae had the chance to break it open. He lofted a little flare behind second that looked like it would squeeze in, but Kataoka made a nice play to reel it in and take away Lotte’s scoring chance.

In the 8th Saburo lead off with a walk against reliever Osada and was pinch-run for by Okada. Ohmatsu singled to right, sending Okada to third. Matoba had the chance to send in the go ahead run, but he struck out. It was up to Kiyota – he lifts a shallow pop to left for Oshima to field. Oshima charges, Okada is tagging! Fast runner versus Oshima’s arm…. and Okada makes it in before the ball arrives! 2-1 Lotte on a great run by Okada on a very difficult ball to score.

Karakawa leaves with the lead and Kobayashi is in – 1,2,3 and just like that, Our Marines have swept Seibu and with the tie in Fukuoka they slip back into (a tie for) first for the first time since early June!

It’s 27 games left now – it’s all in front of them. On Friday a critical 3-game set in Fukuoka with Daiei begins – a series win would be fantastic right now. It looks like Naruse vs Hiroki Yamada for the first game, so chances are good for a nice start to the series.

It’s really quite nice that a successful organization like the Seibu Lions allows older folks to work with the younger crowd, and in critical positions, too! I especially like it as a Lotte fan – nothing like a 47-year-old reliever, released last year after YOKOHAMA thought he was washed up, coughing up a fat pitch to cushion the pain of blowing a 2-0 late inning lead.

And that’s just what just what Kimiyasu Kudoh did – I thank him heartily for it.

The story: Shunsuke Watanabe pitched 6+ innings of 5-hit shutout ball and left with a 2-0 lead (earned thanks to an error by Seibu starter Ishii and a run-scoring single by scorching hot Iguchi). Shingo Ono took over for The Low-Throwing One and mopped up the 7th by getting a DP ball, but got rattled in the 8th to the tune of 2 runs on 3 hits and a HBP, only getting bailed out by yet another DP ball.

Meanwhile, Lotte had a golden chance in the top of the 7th with a bases loaded situ and only one out, only to see Kim Tae Kyun ground into another inning-ending DP. Honestly, other than the continued injury absence of Ogino (Ta-Ka-Shi!) the only real black spot on the current run is the continued profound slump of our number 4 hitter. He’s batting around .230 with RISP and is 4-22 on the season with the bases loaded. I seriously think Nishimura-Kantoku needs to move him out of that 4 spot until his confidence and stroke come back. Fukuura would fit nicely in there.

SO it’s a 2-2 game. Seibu is feeling the pressure of a 4 game streak with Our Marines and Daiei hot on their tail. They want to hold that score where it is until their big bats can take the lead. To accomplish this strategy, they need something special in this critical spot – in comes Kudoh. Bless you, Watanabe-Kantoku! After Fukuura grounds out to lead off the 8th, Saburo sees the aforementioned fat pitch and sends a reminder into the left field stands that Lions fans shouldn’t expect it to be easy. Just like that, the quick turnaround is reversed again, and Lotte has a 3-2 lead going into the 9th.

Kobayashi closes it out, and looky here – 28 games remain, Lotte sits a mere one, teeny-little game out of first. Yes indeed.

Lotte makes their move on the top spot tomorrow with the Baby-Faced Killer (I have my Karakawa towel already packed in my bag for tomorrow) up against a member of the “Inexplicable Announced Starter When You Desperately Need a Win” Department, Fumiya Nishiguchi. He’s older than me and hasn’t posted a sub-5 ERA in about 3 Prime Ministers. Should be a fun one.

Look at Iguchi – does this sound familiar? He’s on an 8-game hitting streak – 12 RBI including a grand slam this weekend. Need someone to get on in the 2-spot? How about Imae, who has had two games total in the past month where he hasn’t gotten a hit (and has scored 15 runs this month). Kiyota has been looking nice in the outfield. Yabuta is back looking like 2007 Yabuta (or: April Yabuta). Furuya has been rock-solid this month (no ER since the first). And thanks to the 11 wins since the 7-game losing streak ended, Lotte is now just 2 games out of first with 29 games to go.

Saturday’s game vs Orix – Our Marines were down 5-0 in the middle innings with Yoshimi on the hill. They needed a lift – Iguchi gave it in a big way with the aforementioned grand slam. Saburo tied it up with another blast in the next inning, and in the bottom of the 11th Ohmatsu ended it with Sayonara Smash to right – the second sayonara HR of the week for Lotte!

Sunday’s game vs Orix – almost a repeat as Kim Tae Kyun came to the plate with the bases loaded, two out, bottom of the 9th, Lotte down 5-3. He pounds one down the line, back to the warning track, all men on base sprinting around, but it’s ju-u-u-st barely foul. See for yourself – it looks like it’s on the line in the game highlights (about 3:30 in):

Anyway, that one didn’t end so well as Tae Kyun struck out on the next pitch. But close!

Tonight’s tighter-than-it-looked game against Seibu really, really could have gone either way. Bill Murphy got the start and really had his struggles early on, giving up 2 in the first two and getting out of bases-loaded trouble in both the 3rd and 4th thanks to He-Man defensive work by Tsuyoshi at short. Take a look:

I’ll be perfectly honest – it looked like this one would go the other way. All of the Seibu baserunners, Lotte missing some chances. Bottom of the 5th, Lotte loads up the bases against Seibu starter Hsu. Iguchi and Tae Kyun strike out. Fukuura gets a 2-strike count, then loads it up. He laces a liner right at Fernandez at first – but it’s off his glove and two men are in! Saburo cleans up the remnants with a cool blast to left, and Lotte goes from shaky to in control. More shades of the early part of the season. Murphy finishes strong through the 6th on a rather astounding 141 pitches, and the Marines add a few more in the late innings to run the final to 9-2.

The series continues on Wednesday with El Submarinero Shunsuke facing Ishii, and My Buddy Karakawa should get the start on Thursday. These next 5 games are absolutely critical – two more with Seibu and then 3 at Daiei. Lotte’s playing some great ball at the right time – let’s make our move now!

The first start was rougher than it sounds (1 ER in 6 IP) as he allowed quite a few baserunners (13, to be exact) but only one of them scored (OK, and another unearned run did as well), which is all that counts. The game tonight, though, was brilliance. 9 IP, only 4 hits and no ER – a 133 pitch complete game shutout of Nippon Ham. Not so coincidentally, the win also drives Lotte’s record for the past 2 weeks (since the end of the 7 game losing streak) to a rather nice 8-4.

Last week the offense was still sputtering a bit – look no further than the weekend series with Rakuten in Chiba. Lotte rang up 11 hits – total! – in the series yet somehow managed to take two of three. In the absence of offense was the resurgence of the pitching, especially the starting pitching. The only bad start of the past 10 was this Wednesday’s start by Watanabe Shunsuke in Tokyo Dome (6 ER in 2+ innings) – Murphy, Yoshimi, Penn, Naruse, and of course Karakawa have all gone deep into their recent starts and pitched well.

The offensive spark may have just restarted this week, too. As I mentioned in the Rakuten series Lotte managed only 11 hits, but that doesn’t tell the full tale. In the first two games of the series Lotte only had 3 hits COMBINED (but split the games). The rubber game was filled with late-inning drama, though. It was a 3-3 game, 12th inning. Imae had just ended the Rakuten top of the inning – guaranteeing no worse than a tie – by making an amazing sprint, slide, and catch to snag a foul pop behind home, twisting in the wind. Nemoto and Tsuyoshi coaxed walks out of Rakuten’s Koyama. One out, Imae at the plate, outfield in. Imae takes a fastball from Koyama and crushes it – plenty deep to get over the outfielders’ heads and score Nemoto, but the ball kept going, going… gone, for a three run sayonara blast.

Lotte took that momentum straight into the Fighters series in Tokyo Dome (a place where they just don’t play well normally) and took two of three. The only loss was Shunsuke’s start, where he just got off to a bad couple of innings. The offense made a furious comeback, getting back 5 runs of a 6 run deficit, but it wasn’t enough.

Karakawa’s opposite was the even more baby-faced Nakamura Masaru, 18, and looking like he should be pitching down at Koshien instead of with the pros. But young Nakamura matched Karakawa most of the game, not getting into a huge scrape until the 6th inning. But the 6th – oh did we get him in trouble. Bases loaded, two outs, up strolls Saburo. One swing later, all men of Lotte were home with huge smiles on their faces. From there only some really nice defense by Morimoto and Inaba prevented our Marines from scoring 10 or more, but Lotte still rung up 7 on the Fighters pitchers thanks to a 2-RBI double by Iguchi and a nice single by Kiyota (who seems to have an Imae-like nose for the clutch).

There’s only a bit over 30 games left, are our Marines revving up for a big sprint down the stretch? We got 6 in a row at home against Orix and Seibu to find out!

Tonight’s pitcher was the great Bill Murphy – he was shaky in the first but awesome after. Unfortunately the offense was far less than awesome so the Marines ended up losing 3-1. As I wander out of the Museum Shop, I stop to shove my goods into my backpack when the nearby gate opens and out comes Murphy and new starting pitcher Hayden Penn on bikes. Bill stops to sign some stuff for some kids as Hayden tools by. I wanted to chat with both so I say “Hey Hayden.” and he says hey but keeps on going. Oh well. I wait for Murphy to finish signing, he says hi and heads off. Too bad, I had some nice things to say, like:

“Hey Bill, sorry the offense only managed one run despite 13 baserunners.”
“Geez, Bill – that’s two games in a row the lack of clutch hits by our offense hurt you.”

So it goes, I suppose. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to actually chat with him before the end of the season. For the record, I’ve only had the chance to chat with a few players this year:

Karakawa Yuki (yay!) – (and of course Karakawa’s mom/dad/sister often)
Bryan Corey (a few times)
Ono Shingo (briefly, but I did take a picture with him)
Ohmatsu (briefly, but often and he’s quite friendly to me)

…and that’s about it. There’s still time in the season though.

But back to the baseball – tonight’s game was quite frustrating as there were plenty of prime chances to score. Lotte had 2 runners on 4 times without scoring. In the 4th, two one, one out, Ohmatsu at the plate. He smashes a line drive right at Fihters starter Keppel. Keppel dives out of the way, throwing his glove up instinctively… and snags the ball by chance. Flip to first as the runners were going, double play. 7th inning, two on, two out, 1 run game. Imae belts a line drive that would have scored both had it been anywhere but right at Hichori in left. Eek.

The 8th was the most frustrating. Keppel was tiring. He walked Fukuura (3-3 with a walk on the evening) and Kim Taekyun to start off the inning and is pulled for Miyanishi. Nishimura-Kantoku makes an absolute baffling move – he pulls Ohmatsu for pinch hitter Masato Watanabe (???), who promptly drops a lovely sac bunt (????!!!!). Why, why, why? I smack the chair in front of me in frustration. Saburo is up – he’s 2-3 at this point. He hits a grounder right back to Miyanishi, who looks over at Fukuura on third – oh no, he’s off third! Miyanishi fires over, Fukuura is out. Aono pinch hits for Nemoto (starting for Iguchi, and drove in the only run) and grounds out to end it. What a frustrating inning.

The troublesome parts about the last week and a half are a) losing 7 in a row, including the sweep at home vs Daiei and the road sweep at Sendai (We haven’t won since 2008 there! I was at the game last time we won at K-Stadium) b) the bullpen being completely awful, basically from top to bottom c) The offense just not delivering the timely hits. For example, Saturday Lotte won at Skymark vs Orix 4-0, but all runs were off of 2-run HRs despite getting 21 baserunners on base. 21!

The starting pitching has been very nice, though – Naruse had a great game on Friday, Yoshimi had by far the best game of his season on Saturday (a complete game shutout), and new starter Hayden Penn went 5 very strong innings on Monday.

There’s so much to be hopeful about – Naruse looks like he’s on another late season roll. Watanabe and Murphy look strong. Surely the timely hits will start dropping again soon. Ono Shingo is back in the lineup (he came strongly out of the pen tonight). Karakawa is also back from his broken hand and will start on Thursday. Ogino Takashi is due back… sometime. And despite the losing streak and the injuries, the team is a mere 3.5 games out of first. We’ll make our move – I am sure of it!

It’s hot and Sunday – Lotte is at home for the final game of a three game set vs Daiei, and I’m at home because, well, it’s hot. Chiba Marine is a bit stuffy in August, for sure. Why not a live blog?

A little update – the last three games haven’t gone so well for our Marines. Lotte had a nice lead in the final game of the Seibu set but had a nasty bullpen explosion to get outscored down the stretch, eventually losing 12-6. Lotte dropped the first two games of this series, too – a disappointing 2-0 loss on Friday (which I was at) and an unwatchable 14-5 loss yesterday (which, fortunately, I was able to turn off after it got way out of hand).

Tonight Ryoji Katsuki takes the hill. He was the surprise of the Eastern League ni-gun season last year and saw limited action this year in April/May, getting the win in an outing against Seibu and getting beat up against the Fighters. Lotte needs someone to provide some quality innings outside of Naruse, Murphy, and Watanabe (especially since Ono and Karakawa are still out) – let’s hope he can give us a boost.

First Inning
Katsuki has a bit of a rough first – he gives up a pair of hits including a timely RBI single by Ortiz as the Hawks race out to an early 1-0 lead. This could have been a heck of a lot worse as the Hawks had the bases loaded and only one out before Katsuki digs himself out of the inning.

Hawks starter Ogura has similar difficulties, but good news for us – Lotte capitalizes on his problems in a big way. Imae and Iguchi draw one out walks, and the massively slumping Kim Tae Kyun (more on him a bit later) drills a ball down the line to score Imae. Ohmatsu follows up with a 2-RBI single of his own, and comes around to score – by a really thin margin, just sliding past the Tanoue tag – on a double by Saburo. Takehara (starting at DH) beat out an infield single, and Satozaki scores Saburo on a ball bobbled by Honda at second. 5 Men of Lotte come across the plate – it’s 5-1 after one! It’s a lengthy start to the game, but one that’ll leave a smile on your face.

Second Inning
Much better for Katsuki – one hit but no runs for the Hawks.

Lotte manages a difficult task – a pair of singles and a double, yet no runs. Kanazawa replaces Ogura but isn’t very good either. Imae leads off with a single and Iguchi grounds into a double play (I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – the most glaring weakness in Iguchi’s game – other than his annual summer disappearances – is his baseruning. After the first out Kokubo misses the tag at first for the second out, but Iguchi misses the bag also and is out anyway. Eeek!) Kim Tae Kyun pokes a single to center and Ohmatsu pops a weird double in front of Ortiz in right (should have been a pop out but Ortiz totally misplays it). Still, all that action, and the inning ends on Saburo’s K. 5-1 Lotte.

Third Inning
My, things got interesting here. Katsuki got to a two out, one on situation then gave up consecutive hits to Petagine, Matsuda, and Hasegawa, and three runs as a result. Eek, indeed.

…but in the bottom of the inning things got more interesting still. Takehara walked and Satozaki singled to lead off the inning, and Kiyota (starting in CF) singled in Takehara to add to the lead! After Tsuyoshi struck out and Imae walked, Iuchi blasted a shot down the 3rd base line that was misplayed by Matsuda – three runs score as the ball trickles into right! The inning ends with Lotte taking a 9-4 lead.

Fourth Inning
The pitching depth (or current lack of) rears its head again. Furuya – who has been rather nice this year, 2.76 ERA/1.36 WHIP/8.8 K/9 in 34 games – comes in and gets killed. He gives up three hits, capped by a Tamura HR to left. Yikes. It’s now a 9-7 game.

Speaking of the feast-or-famine pitching, there’ two interesting recent developments. First, Lotte signed former Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Hayden Penn. He’s on the roster now but I am not sure when he’s making his first appearance – I would figure with so few games left it would be soon.

From Goo Sports

The second is one of our Ikusei players drafted last year, Koshiro Yamamuro, was promoted to the full team this week and is on the bench tonight. I suspect the way this game is going he may see his chance tonight.

Oh, and the Marines went down in order in the bottom of the inning, so it stayed 9-7.

Fifth Inning
In comes Itoh, who is probably the most erratic pitcher on the team. When he’s on he’s brutal, carding K after K. When not… Well, he’s not tonight. He gets two quick outs, then gives up three quick hits including the capper, a single by Kokubo that’s misplayed by Kiyota (he could have possibly caught it, and in retrospect probably should have dove for it), then bobbled, then 2 runs are in. Aaaaand we are back to even – 9-9. Not nice.

Another three up, three down inning for Lotte – it stays at 9-9.

Sixth Inning
Itoh is still in, which is not a good thing at all. Well, unless you are a Hawks fan – he gives up a walk, three singles, and a sac fly as Daiei pulls into a 11-9 lead…

And Lotte can do nothing to counter in the bottom of the inning, managing only an Ohmatsu walk (coupled with K’s by Kim Tae Kyun and Saburo).

As I mentioned before, Tae Kyun has been in a horrible slump. Let me be a bit selective with some statistics: 0 HR, 4 runs scored, 8 RBI. That’s not his statistics in the past week (when he’s been sick) – that’s his stats for the month of July. Egads. Let’s look at the game on Friday – a 2-0 heartbreaker of a complete game loss by Naruse (who was blameless for the loss, IMO, as only one of the runs was earned and the offense blew many chances). Third inning, runners on the corners, two outs. With a full count Tae Kyun looks at strike three on the corner. In that situation why would you be waiting for a walk? You need a run, and he’s the best run producer in the league, the bat needs to come off the shoulder. And again in the 5th – bases loaded, one out, Daiei’s Yamada is reeling. Kim Tae Kyun at the plate, his team needs him — double play. It’s been Tae Kyun’s last 30 days in a nutshell.

We need more of these, big guy. (from Sankei)

Lucky Seven
Yabuta is in – not much changes. Two singles and a sac fly later, another run is on the board. It’s now 12-9 going into the bottom of the inning.

Settsu takes the mound for a second inning, how will the offense respond? Not well – 3 up, 3 K’s. Settsu’s got 5 K’s in 2 innings.

Eighth Inning
Finally, an inning without a run! That’s the first since the second inning. Of course, Yabuta gave up a pair of walks but it’s the lack of runs that’s important.

Falkenborg is in for Daiei – after a leadoff walk to Tsuyoshi he mows down the side. 8K’s in the past 3 innings. You can’t score too many runs when you are striking out. Looking grim with Mahara probably coming in in the 9th. Still 12-9.

Ninth Inning
Well, that’s that. No more runs for Daiei as Kobayashi enters, gives up another hit – the 20th of the game for the Hawks – but no runs. And as I thought, Mahara came in, carded two more Ks, and ended it. That’s 14 Ks on the night, 10 in the last 4. In fact Lotte didn’t get a hit after the Kiyota RBI single in the third. I would say that’s not good, but we did end that inning with a 9-4 lead.

It’s a sweep for the red hot Hawks. Lotte entered the series with a good chance to sneak into first and left only 2 games out of 4th. Of course that speaks volumes about the toughness of the Pacific league, but also a great deal about the bullpen futility right now. I’ve mentioned the Seibu game up front, but not last night’s ugly fest against the Hawks’s Sugiuchi, who was spotted a third inning 9-0 lead and cruised to a 14-5 win. Nishimoto-coach has got to figure something out with that bullpen – we’ll see what happens on Tuesday as the Marines open a 3-game set with Rakuten in Sendai.

I took a half day holiday to celebrate the start of the season’s “second half”, and to pay another visit to Seibu Dome. It hasn’t gone well for me so far this year – two visits, two losses. This was sure to be different. After all, I took a holiday, so surely the team would repay that. And just to tempt fate – I brought The Darned Hat.

Surely, indeed. Murphy got into a bit of a rough patch in the first two innings, but after a talk from coach Nishimoto he settled down and dominated the home Lions. He yielded two in the first and nothing after, and the offense gradually ate into the lead and then put the game away in a very nice 5-3 victory. Ii, ne!

We had a blast at this one. Katsu and I took seats in a pretty empty section of the infield unreserved seats (What?!?!??? Plenty of seats at a midweek Seibu game??? Unheard of. Oh wait, they don’t sell out playoff games.) and I decided to lead the cheering. I got quite a few people around me to join in – there was the older gentlemen sitting alone, the two nice girls and their mother, the mom and two young boys, the lone salaryman, and the middle-aged couple (I better watch that – they were probably my age, actually!). All were ready to give their best to cheer the team on.

It was so hot in the stadium – not just because it was so hot outside (and oh it was) but also because Seibu Dome basically sucks all air circulation out of the vicinity. It was OK if you didn’t move an inch, but if you were running from section to section, high-fiving everyone around you it got real hot, real quick. Fortunately, the one redeeming value of Seibu Dome is the nice food and drink service – a young woman strolled by selling frozen oranges, which really, really hit the spot. She was also selling “Lions Water”, I asked if she was selling “Lotte Victory Water” but the answer was a confused no. So it goes.

Anyway, as I said Murphy got himself into a spot of bother in the first, so the kitty cats held an early 2-0 lead. In the third Satozaki decided to cut into that lead all on his own, jacking a big tall one to the outfield. The bat was flipped. Over the fence, the fans were in delirium – well, at least the ones that count. It was a nice follow-up for his nice HR in the All Star Game on Saturday. I went round and round, high fiving all I could…

Saburo tied things up in the 4th with a run-scoring single. Iiiiii, neeeee. This time the ‘middle aged’ couple both ran down to high five me – we ended up hugging and jumping up and down like fools. Is it October or still July? It doesn’t matter in fandom.

Murphy looked just fabulous after settling down. He ended up going just shy of a full 7, giving up 4 hits (and the two runs) with 6 K’s to boot. It’s yet another quality start. Where would our last few months be without him in the rotation?

The game slipped on. Nishioka speared a bullet from the bat of Kuriyama to stop a rally in its tracks in the 5th – as pretty a catch as you will see. The good pitching, the nice D, the fly balls getting hit by Lotte bats – you knew something good had to happen. Lucky 7 – still a 2-2 game. Saburo flies out to deep center, and Fukuura comes to the plate. B-l-a-m-m-o! A huge, line drive blast to the deepest part of the park!!! 3-2 Lotte, and bedlam, as expected. Finally, we get to crank up the anti-Seibu song!

“Seibu niwa! Makerarenai! Tamashii o komete tatakae!!!”

It’s more of a pro-Lotte than anti-Seibu song, but when it comes out you just know good stuff is happening. My well-spaced-out friends and I sing lustily.

A few more runners get on, and 3B substitute Hosoya Kei (Imae has a gimpy shoulder) drives in another run, pushing the score to 4-2! Iiiii, neeee!!!

Ohmatsu put the cherry on the cupcake with a beefy power pop fly that looked like it barely missed the ceiling but definitely didn’t miss going over the fence. 5-2 Lotte! Kobayashi came in to mop things up in the 9th – he gave up a run, Seibu fans got a bit of false hope, and Lotte (of course) won anyway. It’s just the natural order of things.

A few more bouncy hugs later, and after song after enjoyable song the ouendan drifted home. It was great to see my first road win at Seibu this year, and a lovely way to kick off the home stretch.

Update – on Wednesday Watanabe Shunsuke and the Lotte bats combined to put a major beating on Seibu, 9-4. With that, Seibu is consigned to third, and the weekend series with Daiei gets even more meaning. It’s going to be a great one!