(Story by Marco Stoovelaar)
  Team Europe shutout by Taiwanese squad
Nederlands
 TAICHUNG (Taiwan) -
In its seventh game in the Asia Winter Baseball League, Team Europe was shutout 9-0 on Saturday (December 5) by the Chinese Taipei National Training Team.
For the Taiwanese team, this was it fourth victory in six games.
While this is the most of any team, they are in second place.
In the evening, league-leader Taiwan Beer CPBL Team (better won-loss percentage) won big vs. the KBO Team, 13-2.
Today, the European team collected only five basehits.
On a positive note, there were no defensive errors.
The Taiwanese team collected 14 basehits off of six pitchers.
Besides the 14 hits, ten Taiwanese batters received a free pass (nine walks, one hit batter).
Four of these batters scored.
And with that, the European pitching again allowed too many batters to reach base, besides hitting a basehit.
Team Europe faced an early deficit, as the Taiwanese opponent scored its first run in the first inning off of starter Javier Sanchez Martinez.
The Spaniard is one of the six professional players on the European roster.
This year, the 21-year old righthander pitched in his second season for the DSL Braves, the Rookie League-team of the Atlanta Braves in the Dominican Summer League.
Last year, he was 1-2, this season, he was 1-3.
In his two professional seasons, Sanchez struckout 59 baters in 95 2/3 inning, appearing in 33 games (19 starts).
In the opening at bat, Sanchez gave up a lead-off double down the leftfield-line to Yu-Ning Tsao.
Next batter Chung-Ting Chen also hit the ball hard, but his line drive was caught by first baseman Kevin Weijgertse.
After a flyout accounted for the second out, Chih-Chieh Su singled to bring in Tsao, giving the Taiwanese an 1-0 lead.
Su is one of the players on the team, who also is a regular in the National Team of Chinese Taipei.
Team Europe also got two baserunners in is first at bat off of righthanded side-armer Tzu-Pong Huang.
With one out, the 21-year old Huang walked Sebastiano Poma and with two outs, he also walked Alberto Mineo.
But hereafter, Federico Giordani went after the first pitch he saw and grounded into a force play, ending the inning.
The Chinese Taipei National Training Team expanded its lead in the second inning, adding two runs.
With one out, Sheng-Chieh Lin walked and Kuan-Wei Yao doubled.
They were unable to move on a comeback-grounder, but then the bases got loaded when Yu-Ning Tsao walked.
Chung-Ting Chen followed with a 2-run single that lifted the lead to 3-0.
In the bottom of the second inning, Tsu-Pong Huang retired the side, but left the field on a stretcher.
With two outs, German Maik Ehmcke hit a comebacker, which hit Huang on his left ankle.
Huang went after the ball, fielded it and it to first base, eliminating Ehmcke.
It apparently didn't look that serious, but right after completing the play, Huang fell to the ground and grabbed to his left leg.
Unable to come up again, Huang was transported off the field on a stretcher.
Luckily, he sustained no major injury, as he 'only' had a minor injury to a muscle in his leg.
In the top of the third inning, Sanchez threw a fine inning.
He started with a walk, but then was supported with a nice around-the-horn, 5-4-3 double play that was started by third baseman Rashid Gerard.
A groundout ended the at bat.
In the bottom of the third, Chuo-Chieh Wu took over for the injured Huang.
With two outs, he gave up a single to Sebastiano Poma and walked Kevin Weijgertse, who are two of the best hitters in the European squad.
Before today, Poma batted .412, while Weijgertse batted .440.
The two stranded when a line drive by next batter Alberto Mineo was caught.
German Daniel Thieben took over the European pitching in the fourth.
He gave up a 2-out single, but that runner stranded at first base.
The Taiwanese squad took more distance in the fifth inning.
Chung-Ting Chen led off with a walk and Chih-Chieh Su walked with one out.
Again, the two walks proved to be costly.
After the two executed a double steal, they respectively scored on a following single by Tzu-Hsien Chan and grounder by Ping-Chen Tsu.
When next batter Sheng-Chieh Lin walked, European Manager Gilberto Gerali came out of the dug-out to make a pitching change.
Italian righthander Milvio Andreozzi took over for Thieben.
His second pitch was wild, but it ended in an out.
After the ball jumped up in front of the catcher, Lin had taken off from first base, but couldn't advance, as Chan was still standing on second base.
After getting hold of the ball, catcher Alberto Mineo then threw it to first baseman Kevin Weijgertse, who tagged out Lin to end the inning.
In the bottom of the fifth, there was some good European contact, but no runs.
Maik Ehmcke led off with a single, then Rashid Gerard lined out.
Freddy Noguera then walked, but a double play ended the at bat.
After the Taiwanese team had left two runners in scoring position in the top of the sixth inning, Team Europe got its lead-off hitter on base for the second time in a row in the home half.
Kevin Weijgertse led off the at bat with a single, which only was the third European basehit in the game.
However, three outs followed and so, Weijgertse was left on first base.
In the top of the seventh, Croatian righthander Kruno Gojkovich became the fourth pitcher for Team Europe.
He gave up an one-out single to Tzu-Hsien Chan, but he was caught stealing.
| Standings |
| # | Team | G | W | L | T |
| 1 | CPBL Team | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 |
| 2 | Chinese Taipei Training Team | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 |
| 3 | KBO Team | 6 | 2 | 2 | 3 |
| 4 | NPB Team | 6 | 2 | 3 | 1 |
| 5 | Team Europe | 7 | 1 | 4 | 2 |
After being held scoreless in the sixth and seventh inning, the Taiwanese were productive again In the top of the eighth, but didn't score.
Italian Bryan Sheldon took over the European pitching, but was greeted with a lead-off single by Sheng-Chieh Lin.
A walk followed for Min-Hsun Chang, then the bases got loaded via a bunt-single by speedy Huai-An Kao.
But Sheldon and Europe escaped unharmed out of this situation.
First, a nice 5-2-3 double play followed, then a line drive was caught to end the inning.
A double play also highlighted the bottom of the eighth inning.
Lefthander An-Ke Lin became the fifth Taiwanese pitcher, but gave up a lead-off single to Freddy Noguera.
A strikeout followed, then the Taiwanese defense turned a reversed double play on a hard grounder by Kevin Weijgertse.
The Taiwanese opponent then rallied for four more runs in the top of the ninth.
German Lucas Dickman took over the pitching for Sheldon, but got the bases loaded quickly.
Tung-Hua Yuah led off with a double, then Ming-Hsiu Chan was hit by a pitch.
The bases got loaded when a hit by Tzu-Hsien Chan just landed on fair territory near the rightfield-foulline.
With that, Chan had singled in his last three at bats and was now 3-for-5 in the game.
Dickman struckout the next batter, but then gave up a 2-run single to Sheng-Chieh Lin.
A nice catch by short stop Freddy Noguera on a pop-fly in short leftfield (no infield-fly) accounted for the second out, but the bases then got loaded again when next batter Huai-An Kao walked.
Two more runs were then scored when Yu-Ning Tsao followed with a double.
Tsao was 3-for-4, scored a run, batted in two and was named MVP of the game.
In the bottom of the ninth inning, off of new pitcher Jen-Lei Liao, Team Europe appared to have something in the making.
For the first time since the fifth inning, the team got two baserunners.
After pinch-hitter Daniel Fernandes had struckout, Urving Kemp singled and Chris Howard was hit by a pitch.
But hereafter, Liao struckout Luca Martone and Maik Ehmcke to end the inning and the game to complete the shutout.
The European Team plays is next game on Sunday (December 6), starting at 6 PM local time (11 AM Dutch time).
The team then meets the Taiwan Beer CPBL Team, the current leader in the league.
(December 5)
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