Kan Otake produced an impressive — if long-delayed — second effort on Wednesday, throwing seven innings for the Yomiuri Giants in a 1-0 win over the Hiroshima Carp.

After spending most of the spring working to regain his form in the minors, Otake (1-1) made an instant impact with the big club. The right-hander worked aggressively with his fastball to hamstring his former club, holding the Carp scoreless on three hits and a walk.

Before 44,849 at Tokyo Dome, Otake outdueled Daichi Osera (1-4), who allowed a run on five hits in seven innings. The Carps right-hander walked one and struck out four.

Taishi Ota cracked open the scoreboard in the third inning with his first home run of the season, a one-out solo shot on a high 3-2 fastball from Osera.

“Baseball’s an unforgiving game,” Osera said. “At a crucial juncture, I made a bad pitch and he put a good swing on it.”

But one run was enough for Otake, who mixed his pitches effectively and jammed left-handed hitters with well-located fastballs in on the hands.

“I got here thanks to lots of practice and the assistance of the coaches and training staff,” Otake said. “At the start of the season, I didn’t have either velocity or feel for my pitches. But after keeping at it, practicing morning and afternoon, running a lot, it came back little by little. In my last games on the farm, I finally felt like I had a good feel for my pitches.”

It was the seventh shutout loss of the season for Hiroshima and its fifth 1-0 defeat.

The Giants threatened to score in the fourth, when a two-out throwing error by third baseman Eishin Soyogi gave the hosts an extra out.

Leslie Anderson lined a single to deep right to put runners on the corners and Shuichi Murata walked to load them up for Otake, who worked the count full and was on his way to first after taking a 3-2 pitch until the home plate umpire called him out on strikes.

Another Giants’ scoring opportunity was killed in the bottom of the seventh on a superb play by Golden Glove-winning second baseman Ryosuke Kikuchi.

Anderson, who went 3-for-3, led off with his third single of the game. A sacrifice bunt moved pinch runner Takahiro Suzuki to second but pinch hitter Yoshinobu Takahashi was robbed of an RBI single by Kikuchi, who slid to his right to keep the ball in the infield and still managed to throw the runner out at first. Osera ended the inning with a harmless fly to right.

Scott Mathieson entered for Yomiuri in the eighth and pitched around two singles by retiring Kikuchi on a foul fly for the third out. Closer Hirokazu Sawamura also allowed a pair of hits in the ninth, but held on to earn his 12th save. With fans of both teams raising the volume, Sawamura struck out pinch hitter Shota Dobayashi to end it with the potential tying run on third base.

Tigers 7, Swallows 5

At Tokyo’s Jingu Stadium, Ryutaro Umeno and Kosuke Fukudome homered for Hanshin and the Tigers held on to beat Tokyo Yakult, which lost a season-high sixth game in a row.

BayStars 6, Dragons 3

At Yokohama Stadium, Jose Lopez hit a two-run homer and singled in a sixth-inning run to tie it 3-3 before Takehiro Ishikawa’s two-run dinger broke the tie in the seventh as Yokohama beat Chunichi.

PACIFIC LEAGUE

Marines 6, Hawks 2

At Chiba’s QVC Marine Field, Hideaki Wakui (5-3) allowed two runs — one earned — in seven innings, and Ikuhiro Kiyota doubled in two runs to break a 2-2 tie as Chiba Lotte beat Fukuoka Softbank to win three straight games for the first time this season.

Buffaloes 8, Eagles 6

At Osaka’s Kyocera Dome, Francisco Caraballo went 4-for-5 with a double and an RBI single as Orix rapped out 15 hits in a come-from-behind win over Tohoku Rakuten.

Lions 8, Fighters 7

At Sapporo Dome, Takeya Nakamura hit a pair of run-scoring doubles, including one in a four-run fifth inning, as Seibu overturned a two-run Hokkaido Nippon Ham lead and held on to win in a 17-hit attack.