Kaneko honored again

The Daily Yomiuri

Chihiro Kaneko is on some kind of roll.

The Orix Buffaloes right-hander maintained his reputation as a late-season dynamo by winning his second straight Pacific League Player of the Month Award on Tuesday.

Kaneko, 5-0 with a 2.27 ERA in August, became the eighth pitcher to win two monthly MVP awards in a row and the first since the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks' Toshiya Sugiuchi in April and May 2005. It was Kaneko's third monthly award.

The PL honor for position players in August went to Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters third baseman Eiichi Koyano, while Central League honors went to shortstop Takashi Toritani of the first-place Hanshin Tigers and Tokyo Yakult Swallows right-hander Shohei Tateyama. It was the first monthly MVP award for all three.

Kaneko first made a name for himself when he started seven games at the end of the 2007 season and won six of them.

This year, the 26-year-old has won 10 straight starts since July 1 and recorded a hold with one scoreless inning of relief in his other game.

"I am not trying to win awards, but to be honest I'm really happy," the Daily Sports reported Kaneko as saying in its online edition on Tuesday.

"The team is aiming for a Climax Series birth, so we've had one must-win game after another," Kaneko said. "I've just thrown when I was told to throw, nothing more."

Toritani, whose team took a half-game lead into Tuesday's crucial series against the second-place Chunichi Dragons, batted .422 in August and set a team record for hits in a month with 43.

Koyano, who has inherited the Fighter's cleanup spot, led the PL with 29 RBIs in August, while finishing second in batting.

Tateyama went 4-0 with a 1.71 ERA in August and finished the month by shutting out the Tigers and Chunichi Dragons in back-to-back starts.

In other baseball news:

--Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles reliever Kazuo Fukumori, who underwent elbow surgery this season, will end his career this season.