Baseball

Nishinomiya, Hyogo Prefecture – Kosei Yoshida fell flat in his first start at historic Koshien Stadium since the 2018 national high school championship final, taking the loss in the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters’ 8-3 interleague defeat against the Hanshin Tigers on Sunday. In 2018, Yoshida pitched unheralded Kanaashi Nogyo High […]

Munetaka Murakami scored two runs and brought the Central League-leading Tokyo Yakult Swallows from behind with a two-run home run in a 3-2 interleague win over the Seibu Lions on Saturday. Before a crowd of 29,538 at historic Jingu Stadium, Murakami capped Yakult’s comeback with his 16th home run, off […]

Samurai Japan manager Hideki Kuriyama represents a transition in national team leaders due to his established willingness to go beyond the orthodoxy that holds great sway over the game in Japan. Kuriyama was hired to manage at next March’s World Baseball Classic and hopefully guide Japan to its first title […]

New York – Shohei Ohtani gave up three early home runs and was charged with his fourth loss as the Los Angeles Angels fell 6-1 to the New York Yankees in the first half of a doubleheader on Thursday. Ohtani (3-4) hoped to make amends after being knocked out in […]

Yomiuri Giants ace Tomoyuki Sugano threw eight innings and rookie Taisei Ota finished up a 3-0 interleague win over the Pacific League-leading Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks on Thursday. Sugano (6-4) allowed five hits and three walks at Tokyo Dome, but faced only one real threat, when he preserved a 1-0 lead […]

How does a dance writer from the Northeast end up fixated on a collegiate summer league baseball team from Savannah, Georgia? A few months ago, a video of a baseball coach dancing to “Waltz of the Flowers” — concluding with a virtuosic series of pirouettes — showed up in my […]

Nao Higashihama, who threw a no-hitter last month, was a strike-throwing machine again Wednesday as he pitched the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks to the franchise’s 5,500th win, a 6-3 interleague victory over the Yomiuri Giants. Higashihama (5-1) rarely fell behind in counts and walked none but allowed three solo home runs […]

Chicago – Chicago Cubs rookie Seiya Suzuki’s hot start to his MLB career has been derailed by a finger injury, but the slugging outfielder said Tuesday he will aim to miss as few games as possible and return better for the break. Suzuki jammed his left ring finger sliding into […]

Kenji Akashi hit a tie-breaking eighth-inning pinch-hit RBI triple as the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks came from a run down in a 3-1 interleague win over the Yomiuri Giants that lifted them into first place in the Pacific League on Tuesday. The Giants’ loss at Tokyo Dome dropped them three games […]

Anaheim, California – The Los Angles Angels’ Shohei Ohtani hit a home run in each of his first two at-bats in a 25-hit slugfest on Sunday, but it was not enough to stop the Toronto Blue Jays from winning a high-scoring affair 11-10. Ohtani scored the game’s opening run with […]