Members of the Team All-Europe staff check on pitcher Martin Schneider, who dislocated his shoulder throwing a pitch to Japan’s Kensuke Kondoh in game one of the 2024 CARNEXT Samurai Japan Series at the Kyocera Dome in Osaka, Japan. (Photo: Dante Angiotti/Federazione Italiana Baseball Softball)
OSAKA, Japan – It wasn’t death by a thousand cuts for Team All-Europe on Wednesday night, but it was something close.
Japan got to Team All-Europe’s pitching for 11 hits, and Kensuke Kondoh’s two doubles and three RBI powered Japan to a 5-0 win in game one of the 2024 CARNEXT Samurai Japan Series at the Kyocera Dome in Osaka, Japan Wednesday night.
Playing small ball from the first pitch, it didn’t take long for the potent Japan lineup to get to Team All-Europe starter Tom de Blok.
Yasutaka Shiomi led off with a single to left and got to third when Kensuke Kondoh hit a fly ball to the left field corner that bounced off the warning track and high outfield wall for a double. Then Munetaka Murakami singled to score Shiomi and advance Kondoh to third, and Chusei Mannami followed with a single to send Kondoh home, giving Japan a 2-0 lead with one out in the top of the first.
Pitcher Martin Schneider, who is a firefighter in the Czech Republic, replaced de Blok after one inning, and cruised through 1.1 innings, until he dislocated his shoulder during Kensuke Kondoh’s at-bat and was forced to leave the game after throwing a 1-2 offering to the Japan left fielder.
Duke Von Schamann, a native of Tulsa, Okla., who’s father immigrated from Germany at age 16, entered the game in the bottom of the third in
Before Tuesday’s workout, Von Schamann told World Baseball Network that his expectation was to throw two scoreless innings in a game during the series, and he accomplished it, finishing off the second by striking out Kondoh and retiring Munetaka Murakami by inducing a grounder back to the mound.
Von Schamman surrendered a one-out single to Kotaro Kurebayashi in the fourth before getting Sosuke Genda to ground out to first base and Shogo Sakakura to ground out to second.
“I saw him pitch last September in the European Championship and he’s the kind of guy that doesn’t impress you, but he paints the corners and he just makes his pitches whenever he needs to,” All-Europe manager Marco Mazzieri said.
He got his sixth out of his appearance with a strikeout of Takaya Ishikawa to start the the fifth, but Japan widened their lead to four when Kensuke Kondoh hit a one-out double to right field on a 3-2 count to Shiomi and Kaito Kozono, who walked and singled respectively, and that ended Von Schamann’s night.
“I think overall he had a great outing, and on a borderline pitch [to Kondoh], it was called a ball and then on the next pitch, he gave up the double, and opened up the game and the score,” Mazzieri said. “But I’m very, very happy with how he threw the ball. It meant a lot to eat some innings for us. It was just a great outing.”
They added another in the sixth when Shogo Sawakura walked and later scored on Fumiyo Nishikawa’s double.
Offensively, All-Europe was unable to muster any serious threat, getting just two runners into scoring position, and neither advanced to third.
“Japan, we know, had a very good pitching staff and we couldn’t get it going very much. We only had a couple of chances to score runs and we couldn’t. And a couple of bad-located pitches probably cost us a game early in the first inning,” Mazzieri said.
All-Europe managed just five hits off the Japan pitching staff, but there were bright spots, including hits by Wander Encarnacion and Martin Cervenka in the ninth.
Ryoji Kuribayashi, who came in to pitch the ninth, is an elite closer in Nippon Professional Baseball, and has won an Olympic gold medal in 2020 and a World Baseball Classic title in 2023.
“We had a couple of hits in the last inning against a great closer like Kuribayashi, and honestly I could have asked for more from my players. And, you know, I think winning is always important, but the way you carry yourself on the field is just as important, and I’m very proud of my guys.”
NOTEBOOK: Schneider is out for the remainder of the series with a dislocated shoulder. …Team All-Europe tied Japanese minor league club Hayate 223 4-4 in their final prep game for the series on Monday, coming back from a four-run deficit to tie the game with a three-run homer from Marek Chlup in the eighth and a sac fly from Gabriel Lino. … Infielder Rui Soyama, one of four college players on the roster for the pair of exhibition games against Europe, was diagnosed with a broken scapula. He won’t play, but is with the team in Osaka for the series. … The CARNEXT Samurai Japan Series is being played with the baseball used in Nippon Professional Baseball games, which is made by Mizuno. The NPB ball has a tacky substance applied to the cover at the factory to improve grip, and is approximately 7 millimeters smaller in diameter than the official ball of Major League Baseball, which is made by Rawlings.