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Royals aim to win first road series of season

May 17, 2007 - 2:35 PM Kansas City (14-27) at Oakland (20-19) 3:35 pm EDT

OAKLAND, California (Ticker) -- The Kansas City Royals look to capture their first road series of the season when they conclude a four-game series with the Oakland Athletics on Thursday.

In six road series this campaign, the Royals have stumbled away from Kauffman Stadium, going 7-13.

Kansas City will lean on Scott Elarton (0-0, 3.60 ERA), who will make his second start of the season. In his first start since having shoulder surgery on July 16, the 6-7 righthander gave up three runs and six hits in five innings of a 5-4 extra-inning loss to the Chicago White Sox on Saturday.

Elarton has endured three shoulder surgeries since the 1999 season and is 1-1 with a 5.60 ERA in five lifetime outings when facing Oakland, including a 0-1 showing here.

"(Scott's) a tough guy," Royals manager Buddy Bell said. "He's been through a lot in his career. He deserves everything he gets. It's nice to see him come back and pitch the way he did."

John Buck roped an RBI double and Ryan Shealy added run-scoring single in the ninth inning as the Royals rallied for a 4-3 victory in Wednesday's matchup.

Oakland rookie Dallas Braden (1-2, 5.65) will make his fourth career start. After being called up from Class AAA Sacramento on Saturday, the lefthander surrendered four runs in four innings of a 6-3 loss to Cleveland.

Since joining Oakland on May 4, Jack Cust has seven homers and 15 RBI in just 35 at-bats over 10 games. He along with teammate Dan Johnson were named co-winners of the American League Player of the Week.

"Big Jack Cust, that was awesome," A's manager Bob Geren said. "He hit that one to the deep part of the field on a night when the ball's not carrying. I know it got the team really fired up, got us going. He's obviously a big factor for us because of what he's done. But on the personal side, because of what he's done to get here, it's a great story."