Tuffy Rhodes belted his 44th homer of the season Sunday to regain a share of the lead in the Pacific League home-run derby and power the Kintetsu Buffaloes 7-2 over the Nippon Ham Fighters.

Rhodes got Kintetsu on the scoreboard at Osaka Dome with a sacrifice fly in the first inning and then capped the Buffaloes scoring in the seventh with a two-run clout that pulled him even with the Seibu Lions’ Alex Cabrera for the league lead in homers.

Central League
WonLostTied Pct.GB
Yakult 61 40 4 .604 -
Yomiuri 61 52 2 .540 6.0
Chunichi 51 55 2 .481 12.5
Yokohama 49 54 3 .476 13.0
Hiroshima 47 52 6 .475 13.0
Hanshin 46 62 1 .426 18.5
Pacific League
WonLostTied Pct.GB
Daiei 61 51 1 .545 -
Kintetsu 60 51 2 .541 0.5
Seibu 60 53 0 .531 1.5
Lotte 54 54 2 .500 5.0
Orix 52 55 4 .486 6.5
Nippon Ham 43 66 3 .394 16.5

Meanwhile, the Fighters’ Michihiro Ogasawara scored in the eighth inning to equal the Japanese pro baseball record for runs scored in consecutive games of 16 set in 1950 by Wu Chang-zheng of the Mainichi Orions.

Hawks 3, Lions 1

Kenji Jojima and Koji Akiyama hit solo homers and Kenichi Wakatabe fashioned a five-hitter over 71/3 innings as the Daiei Hawks held onto their half-game lead in the PL standings with a victory over Seibu at the Fukuoka Dome.

Marines 3, BlueWave 1

At Green Stadium Kobe, Derrick May hit a solo homer and scored twice and Yasuhiko Yabuta pitched seven strong innings to give Lotte a victory over Orix.

Yabuta (3-2) allowed only four hits and a walk while notching six strikeouts as Lotte returned to .500 for the first time in a month. Masahide Kobayashi collected his PL-best 30th save.

CENTRAL LEAGUE

Swallows 4, BayStars 1

Mitsuru Manaka and Alex Ramirez hit solo homers and Atsunori Inaba went 3-for-5 and drove in a pair of runs as Yakult swept its three-game weekend series against Yokohama.

Yakult starter Kevin Hodges (3-1) picked up the win with five innings of scoreless pitching and closer Shingo Takatsu worked the ninth for his Central League-leading 29th save.

The win was the fourth in a row for the Swallows, who saw their magic number for clinching the CL pennant trimmed to 25.

Dragons 9, Giants 4

At the Tokyo Dome, Chunichi pounced on Yusaku Iriki (10-2) for five runs on three homers in the first inning and cruised to a win over Yomiuri.

Southpaw Shigeki Noguchi (11-5) struck out nine over the distance and held the Giants hitless over the final four innings as Chunichi took the rubber game of the series with Yomiuri to climb into third place.

Tigers 4, Carp 4 (12)

At Koshien Stadium, Hiroshima’s Luis Lopez hit a two-run homer in the eighth inning to knot the game 4-4, but the Carp missed out on a bases-loaded chance to score in the 12th inning as Hiroshima and Hanshin dueled to a draw after 12 innings.