Guardians 1 - 4 Royals
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Royals use 4 sacrifice flies to beat Indians

Jun 12, 2014 - 1:11 AM Kansas City, MO (SportsNetwork.com) - Yordano Ventura tossed seven strong innings and the Kansas City Royals tied a franchise record with four sacrifice flies in a 4-1 victory over the Cleveland Indians on Wednesday.

The Royals became only the second team to score four runs all on sacrifice flies since it became an official stat in 1954. The Montreal Expos scored four runs by sacrifice flies in a 1980 game but lost to the Cubs, 8-4.

Ventura (4-5) allowed one run on six hits while striking out three for Kansas City, which has won four in a row to improve to 33-32 on the season.

Carlos Santana knocked in the lone run for the Indians, who entered this two- game series having taken three-of-four from the Texas Rangers. Trevor Bauer (1-3) gave up three runs on seven hits over 5 1/3 innings.

The Royals scored a pair of runs in the third. Mike Moustakas led off with a double to right, advanced to third on Alcides Escobar's single to right-center field and crossed the plate on Jarrod Dyson's sacrifice fly to center.

Nori Aoki followed with a single to put men on the corners. Escobar then used some great baserunning to score on Omar Infante's sacrifice fly to shallow left field. Indians shortstop Mike Aviles slipped but still managed to field the high fly ball and Escobar tagged up as Bauer's relay throw was off the mark.

"What you saw today was some tremendous situational hitting -- four sacrifice flies with some great some great instinctual baserunning from Escobar to score on a popup to short," Royals manager Ned Yost said.

Kansas City tacked on another run in the fourth. Salvador Perez doubled to left-center field, moved to third on Moustakas' single and scored on Escobar's sacrifice fly to left.

Ventura retired seven straight batters but finally gave up a run in the sixth. Michael Bourn reached on a bunt single and Lonnie Chisenhall followed with a single to left-center field. Following two quick outs, Santana hit an RBI single to right.

The Royals continued their run of sacrifice flies in the seventh. John Axford gave up consecutive one-out singles to Infante and Eric Hosmer. Billy Butler followed with a sacrifice fly to center, making it a 4-1 game.

Kansas City pitcher Wade Davis retired three straight batters to work out of a bases-loaded jam in the eighth, extending his scoreless streak to 19 innings.

Greg Holland tossed a perfect ninth to pick up his 19th save of the season.

"I think they're a really good team, actually they're a really difficult team to play," Indians manager Terry Francona said. "They have speed, they have pitching, a bullpen, the power's coming -- we have a lot of respect for how good they are."

Game Notes

The Royals had four sacrifice flies in a game for the first time since April 21, 2006, also against Cleveland ... Kansas City went 5-2 on a seven-game homestand ... Chisenhall extended his hitting streak to a career-high nine games ... Cleveland went 2-for-10 with runners in scoring position and stranded eight ... Escobar extended his hitting streak to 10 games.






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