2002 All Star Game 1

The Central League took the first game of this year's two game Sanyo All Star Series over the Pacific League 4-1. The mainstream English press (Daily Yomiuri here and here, and the Japan Times here) focussed on the Tiger contributions to the game. While former Pacific Leaguers Arias and Kataoka both hit home runs, and Tiger team mate Moore got the win, my favorite parts of the game didn't have any Tigers involved.

First, with Cabrera (Seibu) at the plate in the bottom of the 4th, BayStar Miura got a pair of strikes on the big slugger with his fastball. Then he threw a slow curve that was just off the plate inside. Cabrera had a nervous smile on his face after letting it go by, as though the call may have gone either way - and that slow curve really threw him for a loop. He followed that with a double to center, but the smile on Cab's face there was priceless.

Next, with one out in the top of the 7th, Yamaguchi (Orix) came in to pitch starting from the Central League's #5 batter Kiyohara. TV Asahi ran a short segment hyping Yamaguchi's and Igarashi's (Yakult) speed. Well, it turned out that Yamaguchi didn't quite have the speed to blow batters away this evening. After getting Kiyohara to ground out to second, Arias hit the game deciding home run that put the Central League up 2-1.

While Yamaguchi failed to come through with the speed, Igarashi didn't disappoint. Igarashi hit a max of 155 kph and struck out Little Matsui (Seibu), Ogasawara (Nippon Ham), and big slugger Nakamura (Kintetsu), giving up a long two-out single to reigning Home Run King Rhodes (Kintetsu) in between. Igarashi really looked good on the mound last night.

Much to do was made of Godzilla's (Matsui - Giants) bid for 6 consecutive All Star Series with a home run. Well, he failed to get it last night, so all eyes will be on him this evening at Matsuyama.

The standings for the All Star games throughout history now stand at Pacific League 70 - 60 Central League (7 ties).

One other thing I'd like to say is that TV Asahi did a very good job broadcasting the game. They didn't continually come back from commercial after the first pitch had been thrown, and they did their in-game interviews in a box in the corner of the screen, so we weren't without the live feed from the field. This was one of the best broadcast jobs of the All Star games I've seen. Now, let's see if Nittele (Nihon Telebi) can do as well this evening.