Yu Darvish pitched eight innings of one-run ball and the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters rallied to a 4-1 victory over the Orix Buffaloes on Wednesday night.
Darvish (12-2), who leads Japanese baseball in wins, scattered five hits, struck out seven and walked two — taking advantage of his fastball in a 117-pitch outing at Kyocera Dome.
Keiji Obiki gave Orix a 1-0 lead with an RBI single in the second, but Eiichi Koyano hit a run-scoring single followed by Atsushi Ugumori's tie-breaking sac fly in the fourth.
Atsunori Inaba added an RBI single in the sixth and Shota Ono homered leading off the seventh to round out the scoring.
Marines 6, Lions 4
At Chiba's QVC Marine Field, Jose Castillo hit a two-run double and Toshiaki Imae tacked on a three-run homer as Lotte rallied from a 1-0 deficit to score five in the first inning and held off Seibu, thanks to solid work from its bullpen.
Eagles 1, Hawks 0
At Sendai's Kleenex Stadium, Ryohei Isaka went 5⅔ scoreless innings pitching on three days' rest and Yosuke Takasu had an RBI single for the sole run in the first in Tohoku Rakuten's shutout of PL leader Fukuoka Softbank.
Isaka (1-2) allowed five hits — all singles — and Koji Aoyama and Darrell Rasner pitched perfect eighth and ninth innings out of the bullpen. Tsuyoshi Wada (7-2) took the loss.
CENTRAL LEAGUE
Tigers 2, Giants 1
At Nishinomiya's Koshien Stadium, pinch-hitter Shinjiro Hiyama hit a game-ending sac fly with none out and the bases loaded in the ninth inning, giving Hanshin a win over archrival Yomiuri.
BayStars 1, Carp 0
At Hiroshima's Mazda Stadium, Kentaro Takasaki threw seven shutout innings and Yokohama got a little help from opposing pitcher Kyohei Nakamura (0-2), who balked in the sole run with two outs in the sixth for a victory over the Carp.
Swallows 6, Dragons 5 (10)
