Former major league slugger Juan Francisco came up with the much-needed big hit in his first game in Japanese baseball as the Yomiuri Giants held off the rival Hanshin Tigers 1-0 on Saturday afternoon.
Shintaro Fujinami and lefty Aaron Poreda had waged a fierce pitching duel with neither giving an inch until Francisco, who had struck out in his two previous at-bats, drilled an RBI single down the right-field line to break a scoreless deadlock for a 1-0 lead in the seventh inning at Tokyo Dome.
Taishi Ota had led off the inning with a double off the wall in center and Francisco, who last played for the Toronto Blue Jays in 2014, nailed Fujinami's 2-2 cut fastball down the right-field line to break the balance.