(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photo by Henk Seppen)
 Swallows cut Hawks-lead in half in Nippon Series
Nederlands
 SHINJUKU, TOKYO (Japan) -
The Tokyo Yakult Swallows has cut the lead of the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks in half by winning Game 3 of the Nippon Series on Tuesday-evening (October 27).
The Swallows won 8-4 in its first game of the final at home.
The hero of the game was second baseman Tetsuto Yamada, who hit three homeruns!
Fukuoka had taken a 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven Nippon Series by winning the first two games at home in the weekend.
The team opened on Saturday with a 4-2 victory.
On Sunday, Dutch pitcher Rick van den Hurk led the Hawks to a 4-0 shutout.
Game Four will be played on Wednesday in Tokyo.
Recap Game One
Recap Game Two
The game was played at Meiji Jingu Stadium, which is located in Shinjuku, one of the 23 so-called special wards in Tokyo Metropolis.
These are municipalities, all with an own government.
The Swallows held two early leads, but the Hawks came alongside both times.
The Swallows then trailed 4-3 in the fifth, scored twice to take the lead for the third time.
This time, the team held onto the lead and added three more runs in the eighth inning.
After boxer Ryota Murata had thrown out the ceremonial first pitch, the home team opened the score in the first inning off of starter Kenichi Nakata.
Tsuyoshi Ueda led off with a walk, then scored when Tetsuto Yamada homered with one out.
Fukuoka came alongside in the second at bat off of starter Toshihiro Sugiura.
Akira Nakamura led off with a single, then Hiroaki Takaya singled with one out.
The two advanced on a sacrifice bunt by Kenichi Nakata, then scored on a following single by Shuhei Fukuda.
In the bottom of the third inning, the Swallows re-took the lead when Tetsuto Yamada hit his second homerun in the game, this time with two outs and no runners on base.
Again, the Hawks erased the deficit and also did it with a homerun.
In the top of the fourth inning, Kenta Imamiya led off with a homerun to make it a 3-3 score.
...Wladimir Balentien struckout three times tonight...
...On the photo, he is at the World Baseball Classic...
...2013 with the Netherlands Baseball Team...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
In the fifth, the Hawks took the lead for the first (and only) time when Kenji Akashi led off with a homerun (4-3).
It was to be the final run, the Hawks scored in this game.
With one out in this inning, Swallows-starter Toshihiro Sugiura was relieved by Orlando Roman.
He completed the inning and became the winning pitcher.
Roman was relieved in the sixth by Taichi Ishiyama, one of four relievers, who completed the game and gave up only two more basehits.
In the bottom of the fifth inning, the Swallows took the lead again, this time for good.
With two outs, Shingo Kawabata walked, which led to a pitching change.
Starter Kenichi Nakata was relieved by Kodai Senga, but he was greeted with the third homerun hit this evening by Tetsuto Yamada that gave the Swallows a 5-4 lead.
The Swallows then added three more runs in the bottom of the eighth inning.
With one out, Kazuhiro Hatakeyama homered.
Hereafter, Yuhei Takai doubled.
With two outs, pinch-hitter Yuichi Matsumoto walked and was replaced by pinch-runner Takahiro Araki.
Moments later, Takai and Araki scored when Yuhei Nakamura followed with a double to lift the lead to 8-4.
Wladimir Balentien was less successful for the Swallows.
The designated hitter struckout three times.
Tetsuto Yamada became the first player in Nippon Series-history to hit three homeruns in one game.
The only other player to hit two homeruns in consecutive at bats was legendary Shigeo Nagashima, who did it in 1970.
In that Series, Nagashima was named Most Valuable Player for the fourth time.
Yakult Swallows is one of the former teams of Hensley Meulens.
The current Manager of the Netherlands Baseball Team played there in 1995 and 1996.
(October 27)
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