More than 20,000 eager fans are expected to pack the Kaohsiung County Baseball Stadium this afternoon for the 2007 Taiwan Series opener, in which defending champs the La New Bears will take on the President Lions in a showdown for the holy grail of the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL).
This year's annual Fall Classic will feature a potent Lions attack that stormed its way through the regular season with a league-best 625 total runs and long ball threats from Tilson Brito and Kao Guo-ching, whose 53 combined homers during the regular season was 11 more than the next-best hitting duo in the league.
If momentum means anything in this game, the Lions' lopsided three-game sweep of the Macoto Cobras in last week's Playoff Series should provide them with a big boost as they roughed up a Cobras staff with 36 runs over a three-game span to put themselves in position to avenge last year's embarrassing sweep by the Bears in this year's rematch.
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE PRESIDENT LIONS
Facing the tenacious Lions hitters will be a La New rotation anchored by lefties Hsu Yu-wei and Andrew Loraine, as well as former closer Huang Jung-chung, who was bumped up into the starting rotation over the final stretch of the season with the arrival of Japanese veteran Suzuki Macoto to assume the closer's role.
The all-important Game 1 of this year's Fall Classic will see the home Bears send Huang to the mound to take on the Lions' Nelson Figueroa, who jumpstarted the Lions postseason with a big 9-4 win over the Cobras in the opener of the Playoff Series last Saturday.
While Figueroa may enjoy a slight edge in this game with a perfect 5-0 record in five starts since joining the Lions in the middle of last month, it was Huang who shut down the Lions in their regular-season finale with an impressive 4-1 victory on the road that gave his team a bye in the first round of postseason play.
"This could be the closest Taiwan Series that we've seen in years, with both clubs really peaking at the right time," said a league source who wished to remain anonymous.
While many may favor the Lions in this series for their superior offense, some would actually pick the Bears in the best-of-seven play for their big-game surge as they took two out of three during the final three-game set in the regular season between the two clubs.
Regardless of the advantage that either team may realize prior to the first pitch, the series will hinge on how effective the Bears pitching staff will be against a Lions lineup that can blow a game wide open at any time.
With the Bears short of a reliable No. 4 starter, mid-inning relief is a critical factor for manager Hung Yi-chung, who will try to get at least six innings out of his starters in every game to minimize the burden on his bullpen. Tsai Ying-fong and Lee Fong-hua are likely to pick up the bulk of the load before they can turn the game over to Suzuki in the ninth.
As for the Lions pitching, a staff that has the league's top two winners, Pan "Du Du" Wei-luen (16 wins with a 2.26 ERA) and Pete Munro (14 wins with a 2.03 ERA), should be able to keep the Bears bats relatively in check, even though Munro did not have his best game the last time he faced the Bears, which resulted in a 15-4 Bears win.
Offensively for the Bears, the heart of the order consisting of sluggers Raul Gonzalez, Chen Chin-fong and Lin Chih-sheng will try to replicate its success against the Lions pitching in their final two wins over the Lions, while the bottom of the order, headed by Shih Chih-wei, will also look to do some damage with their bat to give the Bears starters the run support they will need to win.
The next generation of running talent takes center stage at today’s Berlin Marathon, in the absence of stars including Kenyan Eliud Kipchoge and Ethiopian world record holder Tigist Assefa. With most of the major marathon stars skipping the event in the wake of the Paris Olympics just more than a month ago, the field is wide open in the men’s and women’s races. Since 2015, Kipchoge has won five times in Berlin, Kenenisa Bekele has won twice and Guye Adola once — with all three missing today. Kenyan Kibiwott Kandie and Ethiopian Tadese Takele are among the favourites for the men, while
Nick Castellanos, Trea Turner and Kody Clemens homered on Wednesday as the Philadelphia Phillies beat the Chicago Cubs 9-6 and clinched a first-round bye in the playoffs. Castellanos had three hits and scored three times. Bryson Stott also had three hits and Brandon Marsh drove in three runs for the Phillies, who on Monday claimed their first National League East title in 13 years. Coupled with the Milwaukee Brewers’ 2-1 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates, Philadelphia secured the bye and home-field advantage in the NL Division Series. The Phillies owned the tiebreaker with the Brewers after winning the season series against the
With a quivering finger, England Subbuteo veteran Rudi Peterschinigg conceded the free-kick that sent his country’s World Cup quarter-final into extra-time before smashing his plastic goalkeeper on the floor in frustration. In the genteel southern English town of Tunbridge Wells, 300 elite players have gathered to play the game they love. “I won’t say this is the best weekend I’ve ever had in my life, but it’s certainly in the top two,” said Hughie Best, 58, who flew in from Perth, Australia, to compete and commentate at the event. Tunbridge Wells is the “spiritual home” of Subbuteo, which was invented there in 1946
Olympic bronze medalist Lee Meng-yuan has become the first Taiwanese athlete to top the International Shooting Sport Federation’s (ISSF) men’s skeet world rankings, while top Taiwanese shooters won golds in each of yesterday’s finals in Taoyuan. Lee’s 6,610 points put him ahead of fellow men’s skeet medalists from the Paris Olympics Americans Vincent Hancock and Conner Prince. Lee on Monday said that he was surprised by the result, although he had expected his ranking to rise after the Games, which was also the first time a Taiwanese athlete had competed in men’s skeet. Despite topping the rankings, Lee said he believed Hancock, who