Kansas City improved to 14-13 and back over .500 this season with a 11-2 victory against the visiting Minnesota Twins before 22.099 fans at Kauffman Stadium. The game featured another come from behind victory as Kansas City opened up a close game with eight runs in the eighth inning to cruise to the win, boosting their home record to 11-5.
Sean O`Sullivan was "effectively wild" as he stated in his post game discussion with the media, as he gave up just two runs (both in the first inning) on two hits over six innings in his third start of the season. The wildness portion came from the seven walks he allowed on the evening. Vin Mazzaro is starting to turn things around at Omaha (10 strikeouts last evening), but it is very likely O`Sullivan has continued to do enough to warrant his hold on the fifth spot in the rotation until he proves otherwise.
Holding a 3-2 lead heading into the bottom of the eighth inning, the Royals had two runners on base with two out against Joe Nathan of the Twins before the next seven Kansas City batters reached based against Nathan and two other Minnesota pitchers to take the commanding lead. The inning was highlighted by Alex Gordon's three-run home run to right field off of reliever Jim Hoey. It was just Gordon's second home run of the season and first since April 5th. Gordon went 2-for-5 last evening and is now batting .339.
Other Royals garnering multiple hits were Melky Cabrera, Billy Butler (including his third home run of the season in the fourth), and Chris Getz. As a team, Kansas City combined for 13 hits compared to just 3 for the Twins.
Rookie reliever Nate Adcock picked up the win, the first fo his major league career as he pitched the seventh inning in which the Royals took their first lead at 3-2. He is now 1-0, while Twins starter Brian Duensing fell to 2-1 with the loss. Overall, Minnesota drops to 9-17 and are the lone team in the American League with fewer than 10 wins thus far.
The series ends this afternoon as Carl Pavano will take to the mound against Royals starter Luke Hochevar. It will be a 1:10 first pitch on Fox Sports Kansas City. The Royals get an off-day tomorrow before hosting the Baltimore Orioles on Tuesday evening.