KANSAS CITY, Mo. — After a couple of weeks of a schedule highlighted by more wins than loses and a couple of rain outs, Mother Nature really cooperated with the Royals Sunday.
It was good news for the Royals and bad news for the visiting Cleveland Indians.
The Royals and Indians were playing a double-header Sunday and game one was all Royals — on n a afternoon where they did just about everything right.
The scoring started in the bottom of the second as Jeff Francoeur slammed a double to the gap in left center that scored Mike Moustakas.
Then Francoeur scored moments later as Jarod Dyson doubled him home. Dyson got the start in center field.
At that point, the Royals led it 2 – 0 after two innings.
The Royals offense was working and so was the defense. Catcher Salvador Perex from his knees behind the plate, threw out Jason Kipnis out as he tried to steal second.
Perez was catching Jeremy Gutherie, who went 6 and two-thirds innings giving up just six hits. Five of those were singles. He struck out five batters with no earned runs.
The Royals also got a home runs from Alex Gordon and Alcides Escobar. It was Escobar’s 500th career hit.
The Royals won the game 9 – 0. Gutherie got the win. He’s now 3 – 0 on the season.
The Royals got two RBI’s apiece from Dyson, Gordon and Escobar. The team now moves to five games above the .500 mark.
Gutherie also tied the franchise record of the late great Paul Splittorff with 16 straight starts without a loss.
GAME 2
With game one neatly tucked away, the Kansas City Royals not only went for their second Sunday double-header sweep in as many weekends.
This game, not televised locally, was a game you wouldn’t have wanted to see any way.
The Royals had three errors in the game. One in the first inning that led to a single from Carlos Santana.
Cleveland led it 2 – 0 in the first.
Then they added three more runs in the third. Former Royal Mike Aviles had a
three-run homer off of Royals starter Will Smith, who had been called up from Omaha. Chances are he’ll be headed back there soon.
The final score, 10 – 3 Cleveland. The Royals and Indians split.
Aviles had five RBI’s to come back and haunt his old team. But the Royals are still in first place by one full game, even though Detroit won at home Sunday night against Atlanta.