Tsuyoshi Nishioka hit a two-run home run and Takumi Kobe's tiebreaking single in the ninth inning lifted the Lotte Marines to a 5-4 win over the Chunichi Dragons in a preseason game on Wednesday.
Nishioka's first drive of the spring gave Lotte a 2-1 lead in the top of the third before Chunichi went ahead 4-2 on an Atsushi Fujii two-run triple in the fifth at Nagoya Dome. Benny Agbayani had a run-scoring double in the eighth to cut the deficit to one.
Lotte starter Shingo Ono struggled, yielding four runs on five hits while walking one in 4-1/3 innings. Kenichi Nakata, who is a candidate to pitch the season opener, gave up three runs and walked four batters in three shaky innings.
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Fighters 5, Swallows 4
Leadoff man Hichori Morimoto hit a tiebreaking double in the bottom of the ninth inning, giving Nippon Ham a walkoff victory over Yakult at Sapporo Dome.
Jason Botts's three-run drive to the stands in left gave Nippon Ham a 3-2 lead in the fifth followed by Yoshio Itoi's RBI double two innings later but a Yuichi Matsumoto two-run double tied it in the top of the ninth. Aaron Guiel hit a solo shot for Yakult.
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Eagles 6, Hawks 0
Teppei Tsuchiya delivered a two-run blast off second-year right-hander Sho Iwasaki to key a six-run third inning and Satoshi Nagai pitched six solid frames as Rakuten blanked Softbank.
Rick Short went 3-for-3 with a run scored and Akihisa Makida contributed with a two-run single. Iwasaki was chased in 2-1/3 innings, allowing six runs on 10 hits at Yahoo Dome. Softbank was limited to just three singles on the night.
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