Shih Chih-wei’s pinch-hit double off reliever Shen Yu-jeh capped a two-run eighth for the La New Bears as they overcame a late-game deficit to rally past the Sinon Bulls 4-3 at the Taipei Municipal Baseball Stadium in Tianmu on Saturday night.
Trailing 1-2 heading into the bottom of the seventh, Lin Chih-ping got the Bears rally going with a one-out triple before Lin Chih-sheng followed with a clutch single, both off Bulls reliever Yu Wen-pin, to even things out at 2-all.
With the momentum on their side, the Bears pulled ahead with a two-run eighth to claim a 4-2 lead before holding off a Sinon counterattack in the top of the ninth to end the game with a narrow victory.
Jermaine Van Buren was credited with his second win of the season, even though the normally sure-handed closer for the Bears allowed a run in the ninth that pull the Bulls to within a run.
Taking the loss was Shen, who gave up three hits to the four batters he faced in the eighth to even his season mark at 3-3.
ELEPHANTS 3, LIONS 2
The Brother Elephants remained unbeaten at 3-0 in the second half with a 3-2 win over the Uni-President Lions in Tainan on Saturday evening thanks to an outing from starter Tsao Chin-hui.
The former Major Leaguer who started the year in an Elephants uniform after spending five seasons with three different clubs in the US ran up the pitch-count to a season-high 107 over six-and-two-third innings of work, allowing two runs (only one earned) on six hits to control the Lions bats.
Doing the damage at the plate with a pair of RBIs was Brother icon Peng “Chia Chia” Cheng-min, who came up big with a bases-loaded single in the top of the sixth that turned a 0-1 deficit into a 2-1 for his team. He would end up with a two-for-three outing on the night to improve his team-best average to .396 (second best in the league) for the year.
North Korea’s FIFA Under-17 Women’s World Cup-winning team on Saturday received a heroes’ welcome back in the capital, Pyongyang, with hundreds of people on the streets to celebrate their success. They had defeated Spain on penalties after a 1-1 draw in the U17 World Cup final in the Dominican Republic on Nov. 3. It was the second global title in two months for secretive North Korea — largely closed off to the outside world; they also lifted the FIFA U20 Women’s World Cup in September. Officials and players’ families gathered at Pyongyang International Airport to wave flowers and North Korea flags as the
Taiwan’s top table tennis player Lin Yun-ju made his debut in the US professional table tennis scene by taking on a new role as a team’s co-owner. On Wednesday, Major League Table Tennis (MLTT), founded in September last year, announced on its official Web site that Lin had become part of the ownership group of the Princeton Revolution, one of the league’s eight teams. MLTT chief executive officer Flint Lane described Lin’s investment as “another great milestone for table tennis in America,” saying that the league’s “commitment to growth and innovation is drawing attention from the best in the sport, and we’re
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