(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photo by Henk Seppen)
 Van den Hurk leads Hawks to win in Game 2 Nippon Series
Nederlands
 CHUO-KU, FUKUOKA (Japan) -
Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks has taken a 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven Nippon Series by winning Game 2 on Sunday-evening (October 25) with a 4-0 shutout against Tokyo Yakult Swallows.
Fukuoka opened the Series on Saturday with a 4-2 victory.
Game Three will be played on Tuesday in Tokyo.
Dutch pitcher Rick van den Hurk started for Fukuoka and dominated in eight innings.
The righthander struckout seven batters and gave up only three basehits, while walking none.
Dennis Sarfate pitched the ninth inning and struckout two more batters.
...Rick van den Hurk while being with...
...Toronto Blue Jays in 2012...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
With his win, Van den Hurk became the first foreign pitcher in the club-history of Fukuoka to win a Nippon Series-game in his first year..
In the first game, winning pitcher Shota Takeda was also pitching a shutout with two outs in the top of the ninth inning, but then gave up a 2-run homerun.
Tonight, the Hawks collected eight basehits, including two homeruns, off of four pitchers.
After three scoreless innings, Fukuoka opened the score with two runs in the fourth at bat off of starter Yasuhiro Ogawa.
Yaki Yanagita led off with a walk, then next batter Dae-Ho Lee followed with a 2-run homerun.
After leaving the bases loaded in the fifth inning, the Hawks added two runs in the sixth off of reliever Ryo Akiyoshi.
With one out, Akira Nakamura homered.
Hereafter, Kenta Imamiya singled, moved on a sacrifice bunt by Hiroaki Takay, then scored on a single by Shuhei Fukuda to make it 4-0.
Van den Hurk gave up a lead-off single in the first inning to Tsuyoshi Ueda, but then retired the next ten batters in a row and 16 of the next 17.
With two outs in the fourth inning, the righthander gave up a single to Tetsuto Yamada, who then stole second base, but stranded.
Van den Hurk then retired the next six batters again, before giving up a 2-out single to Tsuyoshi Ueda in the sixth, but he was left behind on first base.
The Dutchman then retired the side again in the seventh and eighth inning.
Dutch designated hitter Wladimir Balentien was 0-for-3 off of Van den Hurk and struckout twice.
(October 25)
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