Baseball: Giants reduce CL title magic number to one

TOKYO (Kyodo) — Kazuma Okamoto broke a sixth-inning scoreless tie with his 1,000th career hit as the Central League-leading Yomiuri Giants beat the Chunichi Dragons 3-1 on Friday.

The win, coupled with the second-place Hanshin Tigers’ 3-2, 12-inning loss to the Hiroshima Carp, cut the Giants’ magic number to one for clinching their first CL title in four years.

Okamoto’s RBI single and Shogo Asano’s bases-loaded walk gave the Giants a 2-0 lead in the sixth at Tokyo Dome. Okamoto also led off the eighth with a double before scoring an insurance run on a sacrifice fly by Takumi Oshiro.

Yomiuri closer Taisei Ota allowed three singles, including a two-out RBI single to Takaya Ishikawa in the eighth, but picked up his 28th save.

At Mazda Stadium in Hiroshima, the Carp’s Shota Suekane ended the day’s only other game with a pinch-hit, walk-off double in the 12th inning.

The Giants have three games left to play in the regular season, while the Tigers have four.