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Pena sparks seventh-inning rally as Royals beat White Sox

Sep 26, 2007 - 5:33 AM By Robert Czajkowskyj PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

CHICAGO (Ticker) - Tony Pena Jr. went 4-for-4 and homered to help the Kansas City Royals rally past the Chicago White Sox, 9-5, in the opener of a three-game series on Tuesday.

Kansas City trailed, 5-2, in the seventh inning before its offense started chopping away against Chicago starter Jose Contreras.

"Usually we don't have enough fire power to come back from a deficit like this," Kansas City manager Buddy Bell said. "We battle every night. It is nice to get rewarded. We had great defense."

Pena, who homered in the sixth, hit an RBI double. The young shortstop scored on a single by Joey Gathright and a subsequent fielding error by left fielder Scott Podsednik.

"I'll take the hits you don't want to try too much, just let the things happen," Pena said.

Gathright's hit chased Contreras, who gave up five runs and six hits with three strikeouts in 6 1/3 innings.

Rookie reliever Ehren Wassermann (0-1) entered and yielded a single to Mark Grudzielanek. Wasserman exited and Mark Teahen greeted Mike Myers with an RBI single to tie the game at 5-5, and Ross Gload hit a sacrifice fly for the go-ahead run.

An inning later, Pena doubled again to score Emil Brown and came around one out later on Mike MacDougal's wild pitch to give the Royals an 8-5 bulge.

Kansas City 's Brandon Duckworth (3-5) tossed two scoreless frames for the win.

Paul Konerko hit a two-run double, and A.J. Pierzynski, Podsednik and Juan Uribe added RBI singles during a five-run first against Kansas City starter Brian Bannister, who lasted just two-thirds of an inning.

"A Hall of Fame pitcher told me last year that to be successful at this level you have to pitch like you don't care, because pitching is so tough that if you add anything extra to it, it becomes impossible to be successful," Bannister said.