Jackson pitches DeNA to brink of Japan Series championship

FUKUOKA — The DeNA BayStars moved to within one win of a come-from-behind Japan Series championship with a 7-0 Game 5 victory over the Pacific League champion SoftBank Hawks on Thursday to take a 3-2 series lead after dropping Games 1 and 2.

Right-hander Andre Jackson, working on four days rest after losing Game 1, struck out eight over seven scoreless innings at Fukuoka's Mizuho PayPay Dome, and Shugo Maki belted a game-breaking three-run fourth-inning home run for the visitors.

"This time of year, you are running on fumes anyway, so you just go out and do your best," said Jackson, who struck out the side in the first inning and then cruised until gutting out his final inning, when he was out of gas.

"Everything was clicking for me. I was laser focused and executing good pitches."

After stranding five runners over the first two innings against lefty Tomohisa Ozeki, the third time proved to be the charm for DeNA. Third-inning singles by Maki and Mike Ford set the table for Yoshitomo Tsutsugo, who broke the ice with a two-out RBI single.

"I haven't been hitting, and today I was focused on treating each pitch with the utmost concentration," Maki said. "It was good to get a meaningful home run for the team."

"But to be honest, I was probably more excited when I scored the first run to give us the lead."

The BayStars would leave the bases loaded for the second straight inning but were more efficient in the fourth against SoftBank's third pitcher, Jun Maeda.

After back-to-back no-out infield singles, Maki took Maeda deep for his first home run of the series.

Jackson became the BayStars' third straight starter to go seven innings. He allowed three singles, two walks and a hit batsman and lost his command in his final inning but got out of the jam.

After hitting the leadoff hitter in the seventh and issuing a one-out walk, BayStars pitching coach Shinji Ohara came to the mound, and Jackson informed the coach he was in no mood to leave his runners for another pitcher to deal with.

"I told Ohara, 'I'm not leaving this game with runners on base, so leave me in,'" said Jackson, who admitted he had nothing left in the tank when he got the final out.

© KYODO