The Royals overcame three home runs from Minnesota to post a 10-3 victory over the Twins in Minneapolis. Kansas City hitters broke open the game by plating seven runs in the ninth. KC won their second straight game.
The Kansas City Royals improved to 72-66 with their 6-3 victory on Tuesday night. They gained a game on Cleveland to pull within 7.5 games of the AL Central leaders. Detroit also lost, which allowed KC to close to 3.0 games behind second place. Kansas City remains 4.0 games behind the Orioles for the AL’s second wild card. The Twins fell to 51-88 and remain in last place in the AL Central.
Kendrys Morales staked the KC Royals to a 2-0 lead with a two-out, two-run home run (24) in the first inning. However, Dillon Gee immediately surrendered solo shots to Brian Dozier and Trevor Plouffe to tie the game 2-2 in the bottom of the frame.
Dozier now has hit 11 home runs against the Kansas City Royals this season, including three on Monday night.
Gee gave up his third solo blast of the game to Eddie Rosario leading off the third inning to put the Twins up 3-2. However, Gee settled down after giving up his third home run of the game to pitch 4.0 innings of scoreless baseball the rest of the way.
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Meanwhile, Twins starter Ervin Santana held the Kansas City Royals scoreless for five innings after the first. He finally surrendered the tying run in the seventh when he hit Salvador Perez leading off the inning. Terrance Gore ran for Perez and stole second base, before Santana walked Alex Gordon.
Pressly relieved Santana and got Cheslor Cuthbert to line out to right, but gave up a shallow single to left by Alcides Escobar. Terrance Gore managed to score from second to knot the score at 3-3.
The game remained tied until the KC Royals broke out with seven runs in the top of the ninth. Cheslor Cuthbert stroked a go-ahead RBI with the bases loaded and one out in the ninth to put KC up 4-3. With two outs, Paulo Orlando drove in two more with shallow single to right. Eric Hosmer singled in another run before Kendrys Morales cleared the bases with a three-run home run (25).
Kansas City scored seven runs in the final frame despite hitting into two force plays at the plate. Morales finished the game 2 for 5 with 2 home runs and 5 RBIs. Brian Flynn pitched a scoreless night to finish out the game.
Next: KC Adds OF Daniel Nava, INF Christian Colon, and P Kevin McCarthy
The KC Royals are now 2-0 since releasing Rally Mantis II back into the wild.