2001 All Star Game 3

The rubber match of this year's three All Star games is at the big new UFO in the middle of a field in Hokkaido, Sapporo Dome.

Top of First

And Seibu's Hsu throws his first pitch to the Giants' Takahashi leading off, and it's swung and missed for strike one. The game is under way.

After fouling off a pitch, Takahashi hit a line drive that just made it to the left field stands in this huge new dome! The replay shows that it did just barely clear the fence. And the Central League strikes first!

After the next batter grounded out, Yakult's Petagine takes Hsu deep to center, and the Central League is up 2-0 on a pair of home runs!

"Big" Matsui works the count full, doubling Hsu's pitch count for the inning, before drawing a walk.

Kiyohara, starting this evening, goes down on strikes for the second out.

Hiroshima's Kanemoto reached out and made contact with a full count Hsu offering outside. He got around so well that he managed to pull the ball between first and second for a base hit. Matsui, running on the full count pitch, made it to third standing.

Yakult's Iwamura, though, didn't quite get the Taiwanese ace's timing, and went down swinging to retire the side. But not before the Central League got on the board first with a pair of home runs.

Bottom of First

Chunichi's Noguchi climbs the mound for the Central League.

And the first batter he faces is "Little" Matsui (Seibu). And Noguchi strikes out Matsui swinging for out number one.

Orix's Tani, after fouling off a number of pitches, grounds out to second on a high bounder for the second out.

Kintetsu's Rhodes rips the ball down the third base line. The third baseman gets a backhanded glove on it, but can't make a play. Base hit.

Team mate Nakamura, after a couple of big swing and misses, hits a short fly to left for a base hit. Rhodes must have been running on the pitch, because he ended up at third base.

The big Lion, Cabrera, lifts a pitch high to straight away center and starts walking to first. This is a very big stadium, but "Big" Matsui can only turn and watch the ball go into the blocked off seats in straight away center, gyaku-ten 3-run home run!

Daiei's Kokubo strikes out swinging to retire the side. But with two down, the Pacific League's clean up put together three hits concluding with Cabrera's 3-run home run to take the lead, 2-3.

Top of Second

Chunichi's Nakamura grounds out for the first out.

Hiroshima's Kimura follows with a fly ball to right-center, which is caught by the center fielder, and there are two quick outs.

Back to the top of the order in Takahashi, who grounds to Matsui at short, and the side is retired in order.

Bottom of Second

Orix's Taguchi beats out a ground ball to third for an infield base hit!

Daiei's Iguchi goes down swing at a pitch in the dirt. One down.

Daiei's Johjima lines a base hit to right. Taguchi kicks second and heads to third. The right fielder looked like he was going to make a throw, but decided not to. Runners at the corners, one out.

And it back to the Pacific League's top of the order in Matsui. And he grounds right to the second baseman playing his normal spot. The throw to second gets one, and even the speedy Matsui can't get to first in time to beat the relay. That retires the side.

Top of Third

Chiba Lotte's Fujita comes in to pitch for the Pacific League.

And the first batter he faces is Chunichi's Ibata. And the Dragon goes down swinging for the first out.

Petagine somehow made out while Hsu was being interviewed, two down.

And Matsui takes Fujita deep to right! That makes three games in a row with a home run, a new All Star record! And we have a tie ball game.

Kiyohara follows that by fouling out to Nakamura just left of third base to retire the side. But not before Matsui set a new record in tying the game at 3-3.

Bottom of Third

The lead off batter lined out to center field for the first out just as Nittele came back from commercial.

Rhodes is very selective and draws a one out walk.

Nakamura, not to be out done by the likes of Matsui, gets around with his pattented full swing, tosses the bat in the air, and start striding toward first. He becomes the second player in All Star history to hit a home run in three consecutive games. What's going on here? Either way, it gives the Pacific League a 3-5 lead.

After Cabrera somehow made out while Nakamura was being interviewed, Kokubo
grounds Ibata at short, and he bobbles the ball! E-6.

The error doesn't matter, though, as Taguchi flies out to retire the side. But not before Nori's lead taking 2-run home run!

Top of Fourth

Orix's Ogura takes the mound for the Pacific League.

Kanemoto grounds out to short for the first out.

Iwamura, 1 for 5 so far this series, gets his second hit of the series with a base hit to center.

With Chunichi's Nakamura up to bat, Ogura throws a strike down the middle, and Johjima's throw to second to get the running Iwamura looked like it got him to me, but the umpire called him safe. Stolen base. Kanemoto was then struck out.

Kimura follows his team mate's strike out by taking Ogura to the center field fence. The ball is off the wall. And before the ball can be brought back in, Kimura stands on third base with an RBI triple. The Central League now trails by one.

Takahashi breaks a bat in grounding out to short to retire the side. The Central now trails by one, 4-5.

Bottom of Fourth

Hiroshima's Sasaoka takes over on the mound for the Central League.

Iguchi welcomes him with a ground out on the first pitch.

Team mate Johjima then gives Sasaoka a gift second out on two pitches with a ground out to short.

Matsui then grounds to second, but Kimura fails come get a full hold on the
ball, and the Pacific League has a runner on board. Matsui is 20 for
20 in stolen bases so far this season.

Tani singles to straight away center. It's a good thing Matsui didn't go, or a covering shortstop would have probably fielded that one.

With two on, the Pacific League's current home run king, Rhodes, comes to the plate. And he rips a line drive to right. It's not quite deep enough for a home run, but the one bounder off the wall does drive in both runners as Rhodes is into second standing up. That makes it 4-7 in favor of the Pacific League.

Team make Nakamura comes up, and after working the count full, strikes out to retire the side.

Top of Fifth

Lead off batter Manaka (Yakult) drives a double off the wall in right-center.

Pinch hitter Saeki (BayStars), 2 for 2 so far this series with a pair of RBIs, flies out to Rhodes in left.

"Big" Matsui swings and misses an outside pitch for strike three, and there are two outs.

Now, with Kiyohara coming to the plate, Oh-kantoku comes out and it's announced that the Buffaloes' Morita, who wanted to pitch against Kiyohara, will be taking the mound. A native of Hokkaido, you can bet the fans will be interested in this shoubu.

And Morita's first pitch is called strike one on the outside corner. After a ball inside, Kiyo watches strike two go by. Kiyohara then starts battling by fouling off a couple of pitches before swinging and missing for strike three. The crowd gives Morita a big ovation in retiring the side.

Bottom of Fifth

Cabrera, on full count, swung and missed fanning big for the first out.

Pinch hitter Matsunake (Daiei) ground out to Kiyohara at first, two down.

Taguchi rips Sasaoka's first offering to him through the left side for a two out base hit.

Pinch hitter Akiyama (Daiei) becomes yet another Hawk without a hit as he grounds to Nishi (Giants) at second who takes the ball to the second base bag himself to retire the side. Why is it that the Hawks aren't hitting this series? Oh-kantoku appears to be asking the same question.

Top of Sixth

Kanemoto leads off against Seibu's Hashimoto. And he grounds out to Kosaka who just came in to play second. One out.

The Giants' Etoh comes in to pinch hit. And Etoh becomes a victim of the wide foul ground as Cabrera takes in his high foul ball with room to spare for the second out.

Yakult's Furuta pulls a pitch to Nakamura at third, who fires a bullet to first to get Furuta easily. And the side is retired in order.

Bottom of Sixth

Hanshin's Narimoto (formally of Chiba Lotte) comes in to pitch for the Central League.

And Daiei's Johjima welcomes him with a ball that looks like it might make it. Going, going, the two outfielders are waiting to play the bound, but it isn't coming back. That ball is in the 4th row of the stands! And with that home run, the Pacific League has tied their record of 9 home runs in a 3 game All Star series.

"Little" Matsui, who stole 4 bases in a single All Star game against now catching Furuta back in 1997, strikes out swinging. That should be a big relief to Furuta.

Tani, while Johjima is saying that he didn't think that would have cleared the fence in Fukuoka, grounds out on a close play at first for the second out.

The Dragons' Hoshino-kantoku heads out to the mound and relievs Narimoto for his own Kase.

And Kase faces Rhodes, and on one pitch, has a ground out to second to retire the side. But not before a Hawk finally produced in this series with the 6th home run of the game to give the Pacific League a commanding lead of 4-8.

Top of Seventh

Koo (Orix) takes over on the mound for the Pacific League and strikes out a Carp (Kimura?) for the first out.

Nishi, batting for the first time this evening, and hits a short line drive to left that fools Taguchi who had to jump to catch the bound to hold Nishi to a single.

Manaka is completely fooled by Koo's slider, swinging an missing a pitch way outside for out number two.

With Saeki up to bat, Nishi takes off for second and is in there without a throw. But he's stranded there as the third base umpire rings up Saeki for not holding up on the next pitch to retire the side.

Bottom of Seventh

Hiroshima's Kuroda comes up to pitch to the big guns of the Pacific League.

The first gun he faces is "Full Swing" Nakamura. And while Nori-chan lives up to his name, he fails to make contact, going down fulling swinging. One down.

Cabrera, who hit the "unhittable" roof for the second time this season during the home run contest before the game, goes down swinging on three pitches. Hey, Kuroda is throwing well for his first All Star appearance!

Nippon Ham's Ogasawara comes in to pinch hit and goes down swinging on three pitches. This time Kuroda chose the change up to punch out his victim, rather than high fast ball as he did his first two. Nice pitching!

Top of Eighth

Daiei's lone pitcher, Pedraza, comes in to pitch the 8th. And he faces "Big" Matsui to start. And Pedraza gets him on a ground ball to second for the first out.

Kiyohara follows that with a come backer that Pedraza kicked with his right foot. The high bound took too long for Matsui to get him at first, and the Central League has a base runner.

Inaba hits a line drive to the deepest part of the stadium, and off the top of the fence! Wow, that ball got there in a hurry! So fast, in fact, that Kiyohara is held at third on the stand up double.

Etoh lifts a high fly between first and home. Johjima and Cabrera both go for it, and it's Johjima that makes the catch. Two down.

Furuta lifts a fly deep to center, but this one isn't deep enough. The center fielder heads back a couple of steps, and takes the ball in to retire the side. The Central League is down to one last chance.

Bottom of Eighth

Chunichi's closer Gaillard takes the mound for the Central League.

And he strikes out Taguchi swinging for the first out.

Lotte's Kosaka grounds out to third for the second out.

Daiei's Ohmichi comes up to pinch hit and goes the other way up the right field line. He kicks first and head on to second. The throw from right field is ... in time! Ohmichi is called out trying to streach a single into a double. That retires the side.

Top of Ninth

Down by four runs, it's the Cental League's last chance.

And they'll face Seibu's Toyota.

Yokohama's Ishii leads off by grounding out to Cabrera unassisted at first for the first out.

Nishi follows with a base hit to the left side, evening up the hits between the two teams at 11 apiece.

Yakult's Manaka drills his first pitch to Cabrera at first who has 0 seconds to react. He managed to knock the ball down, throws a bullet to second for the force, but the relay to first is not in time. Two down, the runner at first changes.

Down to one out to go, Saeki hits a grounder to second. The throw to first is in time, and the side is retired. Game, set, and match goes to the Pacific League.

MVP

It's a hard call between Cabrera and Nakamura. Cabrera's home run was the game winner, yet Nakamura's tied a record that was set just minutes earlier. Who will it be?

And the decision is: The birthday boy, Nakamura.
Congratulations!

[Format edited by: westbaystars on May 30, 2002 9:10 PM JST]