Back in the air …

Hawks top Carp, halt losing streak

The huge screech heard around Japan Pro Baseball recently was the sound of the SoftBank Hawks skidding through interleague play with an eight-game losing streak.

No one better t o help them out of the doldrums than long, lost Alex Cabrera, who had a solo homer and an RBI single in a 7-3 interleague win over the Hiroshima Carp at The Zoom on Saturday. The Venezuelan slugger had been reportedly caring for his sick mother and was playing in his second game this year for the Hawks.

His contributions helped stop the team’s longest slide in 14 years after it had fallen a season-worst six games under .500.

Wily Mo Pena also went deep, blasting his 11th shot to give the Hawks a 2-0 lead in the first inning. Nobuhiro Matsuda also had two hits and two RBIs for SoftBank, which hadn’t won since May 23.

Tadashi Settsu (6-2) went eight strong innings, holding the Carp to two runs on eight hits and two walks with five Ks.

DRAGONS 2, EAGLES 1

Kazuhiro Wada drove in the tiebreaking run with a single in the sixth inning to back Soma Yamauchi (6-3), who tossed six innings of one-run ball for the win as Chunichi swept Rakuten at Nagoya Dome.

The Dragons benefitted from a base-running blunder that cost the Eagles a run in the third inning. With one out and Ginji Akaminai on third and Aoi Enomoto on second, Jose Fernandez hit a fly ball to right deep enough for a sac fly.

Akaminai, though, was slow coming home, and Enomoto got lost between second and third, and was thrown out before getting back to the bag. The out also came before Akaminai could cross home plate, canceling out the potential go-ahead run.

GIANTS 4, LIONS 3

Shuichi Murata knocked in the game-winner with a single in the ninth inning as Yomiuri scrambled up a run to top Seibu at The Big Egg.

Hisayoshi Chono opened up the ninth by reaching on an error, and Murata plated him with his eighth career sayonara hit, the offseason free agent's first since May 13, 2009, incidentally against the Giants when he was with the Yokohama BayStars.

The Giants, who recently clinched their first winning record in interleague in three years and the fifth time since 2005, also got solo shots from Chono and Yoshinobu Takahashi.

BUFFALOES 6, HANSHIN 1

Bobby Scales and Keiji Obiki each slugged two-run homers to help power Orix past Hanshin at Koshien Stadium.

Ace Chihiro Kaneko (3-3) tossed seven innings of one-run ball for the win.

Nippon Ham at Yokohama were cut short after a half-inning by rain, and Lotte and Yakult were washed out as well.

*Interleague count
PL 51, CL 46, 8 TIES