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Young, Kinsler help Rangers hold off Royals

Aug 16, 2007 - 5:09 AM ARLINGTON, Texas (Ticker) -- Michael Young drove in the go-ahead runs, Ian Kinsler homered and the Texas Rangers held on for a 4-3 victory over the Kansas City Royals on Wednesday night.

With Texas trailing, 1-0, in the sixth inning, Young laced a two-run double off All-Star Gil Meche (7-11). One inning later Nelson Cruz came home on reliever Jimmy Gobble's throwing error at first to extend the lead to 3-1.

"Given the situation, I was just looking for a pitch to drive," Young said. "It was up and away and I went with it and luckily I was able to come through."

"It was out over the plate," Meche said. "He's gone that way before against me for a home run. I thought that one was gone, too. After five innings, I thought I was in control. Then I give up the big hit to their best hitter."

In the eighth, Kinsler added some insurance with his career-high 15th homer of the season against Kansas City's Joel Peralta for a three-run bulge.

"It was a fastball," Kinsler said. "He started me off with a cutter, he threw me a slider, he was down in the count 2-0 and I'm just anticipating a fastball right there and I basically got one and put a good swing on it."

Texas starter Vicente Padilla was stellar in his return from the disabled list, yielding one run and four hits with a season-high eight strikeouts in five innings. The righthander had not appeared on the hill since June 21 due to right triceps inflammation.

"He's a major league pitcher. He had good command and great tempo," Rangers manager Ron Washington said. "He was pain-free when we took him out. He threw some good, hard breaking balls. He threw his fastball in each part of the zone. His tempo was real quick."

Padilla began the outing in impressive fashion, striking out the first three batters he faced and retiring seven of the first eight.

"Right out of the chute, he was hitting his spots, he felt like he was in control," Texas catcher Gerald Laird said. "He threw the ball really well. It was fun to be back there. The main thing was his location. He was hitting his spots with velocity and putting guys away when he needed to."

Reliever Mike Wood (3-1) pitched a scoreless sixth for the win and Frank Francisco and Joaquin Benoit logged the next two frames before Kansas City rallied in the ninth off C.J. Wilson.

John Buck hit a hard ground ball to shortstop that would have been a game-ending double-play ball, but it took a bad bounce right over Young's head that turned into an RBI double. Joey Gathright followed with a run-scoring infield single to make it 4-3.

But Wilson settled down to get Tony Pena Jr. to ground into a game-ending double play for his sixth save in helping the Rangers record their third consecutive win.

Meche allowed three runs and five hits in 6 1/3 innings. He fanned four and walked three to remain winless in his last five outings.

"That's the best I've pitched in this ballpark in three years," Meche said. "We had our chances. It's just bad luck."

The Royals opened the scoring in the third on a bizarre series of Texas throwing mistakes. With one out, Pena beat out a slow grounder to third base and DeJesus singled to right, beginning a Little League-esque sequence that saw DeJesus successfully escape a rundown between first and second and Pena thrown out at home plate in another rundown before DeJesus came around to score after Laird's throw to second went into center field.

"I came in and could only laugh," Laird said. "It was kind of funny. It was one of those things, honestly, it was too funny to get mad, so I just smiled and laughed it off. It was one run, Padilla kept us in and we won the game."