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Seibu wins! The Lions overcame two shakey innings from veteran starter Fumiya Nishiguchi take game 7 3-2, and the series 4-3. Nishiguchi struggled this year with injuries and ineffectiveness, and starting him was a risky call, but he at least gave the Lions two innings without letting the game get out of hand. This set up the Lions to use Kazuhisa Ishii, Hideaki Wakui, and Alex Graman for two innings each, which was enough to shut down the Giants the rest of the way.

On the Giants side, Koji Uehara didn’t manage to make a farewell appearance, meaning his Yomiuri career has likely ended with his disappointing game 5 performance.

Three of the four competitors in the upcoming Asia Series will be nicknamed Lions, with only Korea’s Samsung failing to make the cut. There will still be three Lions competing for the Konami Cup though, giving the series an Anglophile feel.

• Tsubamegun has probably the most detailed write-up you’ll see of game 7 anywhere.
• Simon has a post with pics at jhockey. Check out the air Series MVP Takayuki Kishi gets in his ceremonial dou-age. The Lions don’t seem to be able to propel manger Watanabe quite that high… the pics should make it clear why.
• Deanna has a quick write-up as well. Her game 4 write-up has some phenomenal pics.
• myworldofbaseball has a post on game 7 as well, extolling the virtues of Hiroshi Hirao’s performance.
• Japanball has the official Kyodo summary.
• BaseballReference has the whole Series documented. 
• Sanspo has a whole bunch of pics.
• And finally, a thread has been started at JapaneseBaseball.com.

Once again I’m checking out the Japan Series on Justin.tv and chatting with the community at JapaneseBaseball.com. If you’re up late, I highly recommend stopping by.

Tonight’s game features Koji Uehara going up against Seibu ace Hideaki Wakui.

No gold medal for Japan in baseball — the Olympic team took a 2-1 lead into the 7th, but the bullpen couldn’t hold the lead. Kyuji Fujikawa took the mound in the 7th and gave up a run on a walk and two hits to allow Korea to tie the game. Then Hitoki Iwase got the call to start the 8th and promptly gave up a single. Manager Hoshino visited Iwase after the hit, but left him in the game only to watch him give up a 2-run homer to Yomiuri Giants slugger Seung-Yeop Lee. Iwase had to give up another hit before finally being replaced with Hideaki Wakui, who gave up a couple of run-scoring doubles to make the score 6-2.

Japan went down quietly in the 9th, ending their shot at the gold. I didn’t get to watch the game, I just followed in on Yahoo Live, so I could only read what was going on. I found it strange that Hoshino used five pitchers in an 8 inning game, pulling starter Toshiya Sugiuchi for Kenshin Kawakami after Sugiuchi give up a run in the 4th inning. And I don’t understand why he went to Iwase again despite his recent struggles.

Congratulations to the Korean team – they beat every team in the tournament and deserve their chance at the gold medal.