Thunderless dome ...

Ibata’s 1B helps Dragons slip past Fighters in 11th

The Chunichi Dragons look like they might have to take out a loan to get some runs.

It took 11 innings on Monday night against the Nippon Fighters, but one was enough to come away with a tight 1-0 interleague victory.

Hirokazu Ibata’s bases-loaded single plated Masahiro Araki with the winner as the Dragons got to closer Hisashi Takeda (2-2), who blew the save the night before in a tie.

Yuta Muto (2-0) picked up the win with a scoreless 11th inning. But Shinji Iwata kept the Dragons in the game with strong defensive play.

The righty, who worked seven shutout frames, scooped up a squeeze bunt attempt by Shinya Tsuruoka and glove-flipped the ball in the perfect location for Motonobu Tanishige to place the tag on Yang Zhong-shou for the second out of the inning. He retired Micah Hoffpauir on a fly to right to keep the game scoreless.

The Central League’s first-place Dragons haven’t lost in their last 11 home games. The Fighters, second in the Pacific League, still have an outside chance to win interleague play.

GIANTS 8, MARINES 4

Shinnosuke Abe turned a one-run deficit into a one-run lead with one swing, hitting his eighth homer, and Hisayoshi Chono later hit another two-run shot [his fifth] to lead host Yomiuri past Lotte.

The win put the Giants in the driver’s seat for the interleague title, two games ahead of Lotte. Yomiuri plays at Nippon Ham and Rakuten to finish up play vs. the PL.

EAGLES 5, BAYSTARS 1

Second-year righty Manabu Mima (4-1) carried a shutout into the ninth, and Akihisa Makida cracked his third homer, a three-run shot in a five-run third, as Rakuten topped host Yokohama.

It was Rakuten’s biggest scoring inning of the season [most in one inning since Sept. 16], backing Mima’s 8.1-inning effort.

HANSHIN 1, HAWKS 0

SoftBank catcher Toru Hosokawa tried to gun down pinch-runner Kenichi Tagami at third and instead plunked him with the throw, allowing the only run to score as Hanshin won at Koshien Stadium.

Minoru Iwata (5-5) tossed eight shutout innings and Kyuji Fujikawa worked around a walk with the help of two Ks to record his 12th save.

LIONS 5, SWALLOWS 1

Yasuyuki Kataoka had three hits and led five players with at least one RBI, and Takayuki Kishi (6-5) scattered three hits and a walk for one run over eight frames as Seibu topped host Yakult.

Kishi also singled and scored in the third, when loser Masanori Ishikawa (4-6) uncorked a wild pitch, and Takeya Nakamura added an RBI single that gave Seibu the lead for good.

CARP 6, BUFFALOES 1

Shota Dobayashi hit his first homer in a month, a three-run shot, and Kan Otake (5-2) tossed 6.2 scoreless innings as Hiroshima topped visiting Orix.

*Interleague count
PL 56, CL 52, 9 TIES