After giving up five unearned runs in the first inning, the RP clouters never recovered and took a 5-0 beating from the Japanese squad. Even the superb relief pitching job by Reynald Tiu, who held their opponents scoreless the rest of the game, could not turn the tide and inspire the boys to get their bats going.
They fell behind, 0-6, in the last inning of the second game, but this time, they won, 7-6, opposite Singapore behind a barrage of hits from Jeff Waller, Richard Bucud, Kirk Dehler, Chris Jocson, Jerry Dario and Abet Sison.
They are running second in bracket A before their game against the second seeds of brackets B and C. They face the winner of the Australia-Malaysia game and the winner of the Indonesia-USA game, the next day.
A win in both games will send them to the semis.
Tot Baseball president Boy Tingzon said they are also hoping to improve on last year’s second place finish before the tournament returns to the Manila in Aug. 2003.