Royal pains ...

Marines send Fighters to 4th straight loss

Yuki Saito is known as the “Handkerchief Prince,” but the defending Japan Series Champion Lotte Marines are still the kings.

The Marines fell behind by a run in the sixth, but scored one in the seventh to tie and former Fighter Takahito Kudo came up with the biggest punch, a two-run double in the eighth as Lotte topped the skidding Fighters 3-2 on Tuesday at Sapporo Dome.

Saito went six scoreless innings and the Fighters, losers of four straight, took the lead in the bottom of the six and Saito was in line for the win until the Marines scored an unwarned run in the seventh to get even.

Kudo, who was the Fighters’ ninth-round draft pick in 2004, came up as a pinch-hitter and doubled to left.

“This is a special place for me so I’m glad I could get it done here,” Kudo said in the hero interview. “We won tonight with our ace and that means a lot, and we want to put a run together and stay in the pennant race,” Kudo said of the third-place Marines.

Winner Yoshihisa Naruse (7-8) surrendered seven hits, with a walk and three Ks over 7.2 innings to get the victory. He loaded the bases with one out in the eighth and got Sho Nakata before departing. Tomas de la Rose gave up a hard line drive to left that was right at Ikuhiro Kiyota for the third out.

Sho Nakata drove in both runs for the Fighters, and Saito worked around four hits and five walks with the help of two Ks.

BUFFALOES 6, HAWKS 2

Lee Seung Yeop added to Mitsutaka Goto’s game-tying homer with a go-ahead RBI double in the seventh, and Takahiro Okada added a two-run double that capped a three-run eighth as host Orix came back to top front-running SoftBank.

Chihiro Kaneko (6-1) picked up the victory with seven innings, allowing two runs, one earned, on eight hits and four walks with four strikeouts.

EAGLES 4, LIONS 1

Rookie lefty Takahiro Shiomi (4-5) shut down Seibu on five hits for his second complete game as Rakuten won at The Kleenex Box.

Yosuke Takasu’s RBI single in the sixth broke a 1-1 tie and sparked a three-run inning as Rakuten won its fourth straight at home and sent Seibu ace Hideaki Wakui (5-8) to a PL-worst eighth loss.

CENTRAL LEAGUE

TIGERS 2, GIANTS 1

Atsushi Nomi (5-7) scattered six hits and three walks over seven scoreless innings to outpitch Dicky Gonzalez (1-3) as Hanshin beat Yomiuri at Tokyo Dome.

The Tigers scored on Kentaro Sekimoto’s fourth-inning RBI groundout and added a run later in the frame on Yomiuri center fielder Hisayono Chono’s error.

SWALLOWS 1, DRAGONS 0

Masanori Ishikawa (4-1) went eight scoreless innings and Kazuhiro Hatakeyama knocked in the only run of the game with a third-inning sac fly as front-running Yakult won at Nagoya Dome to knock Chunichi down a notch in the standings.

Lim Chang Yong put the first Dragons runner on in the ninth inning but retired the next three for his 21st save.

CARP 2, BAYSTARS 0

Kenta Maeda (6-7) tossed his first shutout of the season, a three-hitter with one walk and four Ks, and Jun Hirose and Masato Akamatsu drove in runs to lift Hiroshima at Yokohama.

The win moved the Carp into third-place.