The Nippon Ham Fighters scored seven runs in the second inning and rookie Mitsuo Yoshikawa pitched his first career shutout as the Pacific League front-runners cruised to an 8-0 win over the Orix Buffaloes on Thursday.
Lions outfielder G.G. Sato, right, is welcomed by his teammates at the bench after hitting a
two-run home run in the second inning against the Chiba Lotte Marines at Goodwill Dome on Thursday. Seibu
won 5-3.
KYODO PHOTOShinya Tsuruoka opened the scoring in the second with a bases-loaded single and Hichori Morimoto followed with a two-run single to make it 3-0. After Nippon Ham reloaded the bases, Tom Davey (5-7) hit Atsunori Inaba with a pitch before Fernando Seguignol singled home two runs.
Lions 5, Marines 3
At Goodwill Dome, Kazuhiro Wada, Takumi Kuriyama and Masahide Kaizuka hit consecutive two-out RBI singles in the first inning and Seibu went on to hand Chiba Lotte the loss.
Hawks 4, Eagles 1
At Fukuoka's Yahoo Dome, Hiroki Kokubo homered and Toshiya Sugiuchi threw 7 2/3 solid innings at as Softbank ended its losing streak against Tohoku Rakuten at four games.
CENTRAL LEAGUE
Carp 3, Swallows 2
At Jingu Stadium, Pinch-hitter Jun Hirose delivered a tiebreaking homer in the ninth inning and the Hiroshima Carp held off Tokyo Yakult to snap a seven-game losing skid in the Central League.
BayStars 6, Dragons 3
At Yokohama Stadium, Takahiro Saeki hit a three-run game-winning homer in the bottom of the ninth inning, lifting the BayStars past second-place Chunichi.
The Dragons' Kazuki Inoue had a double that broke a 2-2 tie in the seventh but Yokohama retied it on Katsuaki Furuki's pinch-hit RBI single in the eighth.
Tigers at Giants — late.