Monday, Sep. 5, 2011

OSAKA — Mitsutaka Goto went 2-for-4 with a homer and two RBIs Sunday, helping lead the Orix Buffaloes to their seventh win in a row in a 5-3 victory over the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters.

Go-to guy: Mitsutaka Goto hits a home run for the Buffaloes against the Fighters on Sunday. KYODO

Sho Nakata got Nippon Ham on the scoreboard with a run-scoring single in the first inning, but Orix went ahead 3-1 in the second on a wild pitch by Brian Wolfe (11-7) and RBI singles from Tomotaka Sakaguchi and Goto at Kyocera Dome.

Goto led off the fifth with a drive to right and Aarom Baldiris added a solo shot in the eighth.

Goto has extended his hitting streak to 17 games. Orix completed its first three-game sweep of Nippon Ham since August 2008.

"We have good momentum," Buffaloes manager Akinobu Okada said. "Our pitchers didn't walk a batter today. Everyone is playing his role. Losing is not acceptable since September is a crucial month."

Lions 12, Hawks 2

At Seibu Dome, catcher Tatsuyuki Uemoto had his first career grand slam and drove in six runs and Takeya Nakamura hit his baseball-leading 37th homer as Seibu routed PL leader Softbank.

Eagles 6, Marines 3

At Chiba's QVC Marine Field, Masato Nakamura hit a two-run triple in the fifth inning among his three hits as Tohoku Rakuten wrapped up a three-game sweep of Chiba Lotte.

CENTRAL LEAGUE

Carp 4, Dragons 0

At Mazda Stadium, Kenta Kurihara hit a two-run homer in the fifth and Kenta Maeda (8-8) threw seven shutout innings, leading Hiroshima over Chunichi.

BayStars 2, Tigers 0 (8)

At Koshien Stadium, Shuichi Murata had RBI singles in the first and eighth innings and Daisuke Miura (3-3) pitched his first shutout since May 8, 2009, as Yokohama beat Hanshin in a game called in the bottom of the eighth because of rain.

Carp 4, Dragons 0

At Hiroshima's Mazda Stadium, Kenta Kurihara hit a two-run homer in the fifth and Kenta Maeda (8-8) threw seven shutout innings.

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