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Thomson pays off for Royals in win over Angels

Jun 26, 2007 - 6:10 AM ANAHEIM, California (Ticker) -- It did not take long for the signing of John Thomson to pay off for the Kansas City Royals.

Signed to a one-year contract by the Royals on Friday, two days after being released by the Toronto Blue Jays, Thomson held the best home team in baseball in check as the Royals posted a 5-3 victory over the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

Thomson pitched seven strong innings to hand the Angles a rare home loss. They entered Monday as the best home team in baseball, sporting a 29-10 record.

"It's definitely a good feeling to come back and pitch up here again after dealing with all my injuries," Thomson said.

Thomson (1-0) allowed three runs on six hits in a stark contrast to his last outing. Thomson last pitched for the Toronto Blue Jays Class AAA affiliate, allowing six runs on seven hits in five innings.

"It was tough work to get back where I wanted to be," Thomson said. "I know as I get older that I have to keep working hard to stay up here."

Joakim Soria logged the eighth and Octavio Dotel pitched a perfect ninth for his seventh save of the season.

"J.T. came out here and gave us a great outing," Royals manager Buddy Bell said. "We got four runs early which helped us get to our bullpen, which is the strength of our team."

Kansas City got to starter John Lackey (10-5) in the second inning, reaching him for four hits in the frame. Alex Gordon singled to right with one out, followed by a single from Ryan Shealy and then a RBI single from catcher Jason LaRue.

"I ran into some trouble and made bad mistakes early on in the game," Lackey said.

Lackey got a strikeout, but then hit Joey Gathright with a pitch to load the bases. Leadoff hitter David DeJesus then added a run-scoring single to right which was followed by an error on Angels catcher Mike Napoli which allowed the other two runners to score making it 4-0.

"We know that he (Lackey) is one of the toughest pitchers in the League so we just had to put runs on the board before he settled down," Gathright said.

Lackey, who was skipped in the rotation on Sunday due to tightness in his right shoulder, pitched eight innings and allowed three earned runs on seven hits while fanning seven and walking one. Lackey's career record against the Royals is now 2-3.

"My arm felt fine out there tonight," Lackey said. "I just need to put this outing behind me and get ready to make my next start."

The Angels got on the board in the second inning when Vladimir Guerrero led off the inning with a double and later scored on a sacrifice fly by Howie Kendrick to make the score 5-1.

"We put ourselves in a hole and had to play catch up the rest of the way," Angels manager Mike Scioscia said. "We lost, but it was good to see Lack (Lackey) back out there for us again."

Kendrick then singled with one out in the fifth and was plated by Kendry Morales' double to cut the deficit to 5-2. Morales later scored on a sacrifice fly by Napoli to make it 5-3.