Dutchies very succesful in game two of Climax Series

The two Dutchies that play in the Japanese professional league, the NPB, were very successful today in game two of the Climax Series, the semi finals of Japanese Pro Baseball.

Curacao born Wladimir Balentien bounced back from a hitless game yesterday. His team, the Yakult Swallows, were not so successful yesterday either as they fell 4-1 to the Yomiuri Giants in the semi finals of the Central League.
But the Swallows also bounced back today as they blanked the Giants 4-0. Wladimir Balentien was responsible for two runs of the four that the Swallows scored. With two timely hits to center field, Balentien drove in two runs He also hit a double in the ninth, but that didn’t result in another run for the Swallows.

Balentien also made a judgement error in the top of the eighth as Giants’ center fielder Soichiro Tateoka hit a fly ball towards Balentien who came in instead of paddling back. Well covered by the Swallow’s center fielder, Balentien let the latter pick up the ball and throw out Tateoka as he recklessly tried to stretch a double into a triple. Thanks to this result, the Yakult Swallows, who won the Central League and thus were awarded an extra win, are now leading the Climax Series 2-1. With his good performance of today, Wladimir’s batting average jumped from .000 to .375.

Rick van den Hurk took the mound for reigning champion Softbank Hawks. But it wasn’t all that easy for him as he needed about 100 pitches to get through the first four innings. Eventually he settled down and stretched his performance through the first half of the sixth inning. In the second inning, the Hawks took a 1-0 lead on a solo homerun by Korean DH Dae-Ho Lee. In the top of the fourth, Rick allowed the only run to the Chiba Lotte Marines as they scored on Tatsuhiro Tamura’s single towards first base. Eventually Rick left the game with a 1-1 tie, but his team mates flexed their muscles in the bottom of the sixth and scored five more runs, so Rick would get the W behind his name. In six innings, Rick threw 118 pitches and allowed that one run as mentioned before. He fanned five, walked one and hit one batter with a pitch. Thanks to this performance, Rick has a 1-0 record with a 1.50 ERA in the play offs. The Hawks already started the climax series with an awarded (extra) win as they had won the Pacific League and thanks to this win and yesterday’s win over the Marines, they have a commanding 3-0 lead in this best of seven (six actually as there are only six games scheduled).