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| Meche, Aviles propel Royals past Giants KANSAS CITY 5, SAN FRANCISCO 3 |
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By Pat Madden PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer KANSAS CITY, Missouri (Ticker) -- Gil Meche won his second straight game and Mike Aviles continued his hot hitting in helping the Kansas City Royals to a 5-3 victory against the San Francisco Giants on Saturday. Meche (5-8), who won consecutive games for the first time this season, took a no-hitter into the fifth inning. He finished the night by allowing two runs on three hits in 5 2/3 innings while striking out seven and walking two. The victory was the second of his career against the Giants. "After the fourth (inning), I looked up and saw 70 pitches," Meche said. "Strikeouts are good, but that's the downfall of it. The times I wasn't striking guys out, I was still 2-2, 3-2, deep in counts. Me being a four-seam pitcher, I'm going to get a lot of foul balls, and tonight was a good example of that." "He looked very powerful coming out," Kansas City manager Trey Hillman said. "He located his fastball on both sides of the plate and mixed in a few cutters to keep them off his his fastball. He pitched very well." "He's got good stuff and it was tough to see," San Francisco center fielder Aaron Rowand said. "That combination is never good for a hitter. He's got great stuff. He threw the ball good today. We just didn't get enough hits." Aviles, who is now hitting .357 (20-for-56) in 14 games since he recorded his first major league hit at Yankee Stadium June 6, extended the Royals advantage with a two-out, two-run single to center in the fourth inning. "After I got a strike on me, I went back to my original plan of trying to go right back through the box and hopefully something good will happen," Aviles said. "In that situation, it's easy to try to do too much. I just tried to bear down and hit the ball right back up the middle." "Mike had a real good day at the plate," Hillman said. "The breaking ball caught a little too much of the plate, but Mike put a good swing on it and stayed with it." Joakim Soria pitched a perfect ninth inning to earn his 19th save in 20 opportunities this season for the Royals, who won for the sixth time in seven games. San Francisco's Kevin Correia (1-5), making his first start since April 26, was charged with his fourth straight loss. He allowed three runs on six hits in five innings of work while striking out two and walking three batters. Correia is now 0-2 in career interleague starts. "I felt all right, physically great," Correia said. "My stuff was not very good as far as off-speed pitches." "He walked some guys tonight and ran some deep counts," Giants manager Bruce Bochy said. "He was a little off. That said, even though he was a little off, he kept us in the game. He definitely worked hard, but he walked too many." Jose Guillen's 12th home run of the season, a two-run blast to left center field in the seventh inning, gave the Royals a 5-2 advantage. Guillen, who is currently in third place in the American League with 57 runs batted in, is batting .435 (27-for-62) with five home runs, eight doubles and 19 RBI in his last 15 games. The Giants scored two runs in the sixth on a throwing error by Meche and a sacrifice fly by Bengie Molina and plated another run off Molina's eighth-inning sacrifice fly. Kansas City posted its eighth interleague victory of the season in 11 opportunities. Fred Lewis extended his hitting streak to a career best 11 games with a single in the sixth inning for San Francisco, which lost for the seventh time in its last 11 contests. |
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