Phillies and MLB leading slugger Ryan Howard is tearing up the post-season  MLB/Japan All Stars series.

In the warm-up “friendly” game before the opener, Howard clubbed a solo homer to centerfeld in the 6th inning and Andruw Jones followed with a solo homer which landed in nearly the same place as Howard’s as the MLB squad battled back to narrow Japan’s lead.  The MLB squad battled all the back to tie the game in the 9th inning resulting in the game ending in a 7-7 tie after the regulation 9 innings at the Tokyo Dome.

On Friday night, the MLB team narrowly defeated the Japanese team by a  3-2 score in the opener of the 8 game series in Japan.

Howard led off the 2nd inning with a double, advanced to 3rd on a wild pitch.  Later, with the sacks jammed, Howard being on 3rd base. Chase Utley swung hard going for a grand slam but instead trickled the ball a few feet forward enabling Howard to score.

In game 2, Howard teed-off on Japanese pitching with 2 homers as MLB won the game by an 8-6 score. 

Howard’s first shot was in the 2nd inning to leftfield to give the MLB squad a 1-0 lead.  Andruw Jones followed with a double and scored on the Japanese pitcher’s throwing error.  2-0 MLB  Japan tied the game in their half of the 2nd. 

However, in the MLB 3rd inning, with a man on and after the MLB squad regained the lead, Howard plastered a towering 2 run shot which landed just below the scoreboard in centerfield in Tokyo Dome.

The five-game series continues Sunday at the Tokyo Dome.  On Tuesday and Wednesday the two squads compete in games in Osaka and Fukuoka.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, November 4th, 2006 at 4:23 pm and is filed under Real-Time Baseball News and Commentary, All Time Hitting Highlights, Off-Season Action. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.