A muffled roar …

Lions get slugger back, but can’t stop slide

The Seibu Lions got their slugger back and looked ready to bite back in the Pacific League pennant chase.
Instead, the Lotte Marines left them with a bad taste in their mouths at Chiba Marine Stadium on Wednesday.
Saburo Omura’s solo shot off reliever Kimiyasu Kudo (0-2) broke a tie in the eighth inning and gave the Marines a 3-2 win over the front-running Lions, who dropped their fifth straight.
Lotte has won five of six and moved a game behind the Lions and a half-game back of the Fukuoka Hawks. The Lions, who have been decimated by injuries, saw the return of cleanup man Takeya “Okawari-kun” Nakamura -- out much of the season after opting to have surgery on his right elbow.
The slugger doubled and singled, but Saburo connected for his 16th longball, his only hit in four at-bats, while Tsuyoshi Nishioka had three hits and scored on a wild pitch for the Marines.
Kudo, a 47-year-old lefty in his 29th year, has been ineffective, to say the most.
His WHIP coming into the game was 2.44 and his ERA after .2 innings climbed to 10.50. He has allowed six runs on nine hits in 5.1 innings this season.

BUFFALOES 4, HAWKS 2
Chihiro Kaneko scattered four hits over eight innings to win his ninth straight decision, giving him a career-best 13th victory as Orix topped SoftBank at Fukuoka Yahoo! Japan Dome.
Alex Cabrera and Tomotaka Sakaguchi each had two hits and an RBI to back Kaneko (13-7), who fanned a career-best-tying 12.

FIGHTERS 11, EAGLES 4
Eiichi Koyano added to his league-leading RBI total, driving in three with a double and two singles as visiting Nippon Ham downed Rakuten.

TIGERS 22, CARP8
A five-run deficit was not much of a roadblock for Hanshin, which scored a club-record 22 runs on 20 hits to come back and smash Hiroshima at Kyocera Dome Osaka to halt a four-game skid.
Tomoaki Kanemoto highlighted a seven–run seventh with a go-ahead grand slam, and Takashi Toritani and Kenji Jojima added two of Hanshin’s five longballs in a win that moved the Tigers back into first place.

DRAGONS 5, GIANTS 2
Daisuke Yamai (6-4) worked 7.1 sharp innings, and Masahiko Morino doubled in the eventual game-winning run to break a 2-2 tie in the seventh inning as Chunichi beat host Yomiuri for the fourth time in five meetings.

SWALLOWS 7, BAYSTARS 6
Norichika Aoki went 4-for-5 with three RBIs and host Yakult held off a late Yokohama rally to win its third straight.