Olson, Lowrie lead A’s to win against Detroit

DETROIT Matt Olson homered, Jed Lowrie drove in three runs and the Oakland Athletics beat the Detroit Tigers 8-3 on Monday night.

Olson became the first A's player to homer in four straight games since Coco Crisp in 2013, and now has 14 home runs in his last 20 games.

Tigers reliever Jeff Ferrell left the game in the eighth inning after getting hit in the head with a line drive off the bat off Ryon Healy. The hit was measured at 102.6 mph by StatCast and hit Ferrell in the right side of the head.

He never went down, but jogged immediately toward the Detroit dugout and was escorted to the clubhouse.

Yankees 2, Twins 1

Aaron Judge hit his 44th home run, Aroldis Chapman pitched out of big trouble in the eighth inning and the New York Yankees edged the Minnesota Twins 2-1 on Monday night to increase their AL wild-card lead.

Todd Frazier hit a tiebreaking sacrifice fly in the sixth, and Jaime Garcia gave the Yankees a splendid performance against the team that traded him this year after only one start. New York, still chasing first-place Boston in the AL East, won the opener of a three-game series that could serve as a potential post-season preview two weeks from now.

Phillies 4, Dodgers 3

Through 10 seasons, 287 starts and more than 1,900 innings, Clayton Kershaw had never given up a grand slam. Until Monday night.

Aaron Altherr hit his second career grand slam, a 418-foot blast to left off Kershaw in the sixth, to lead the Philadelphia Phillies past the Los Angeles Dodgers and their ace, 4-3.

“We had the lead and I blew it,” Kershaw said.

Chris Taylor and Justin Turner led off the game with consecutive homers and Curtis Granderson also went deep for the Dodgers, who opened play with a magic number of four to clinch the NL West. At 96-54, Los Angeles still has the best record in baseball.

Brewers 3, Pirates 0

Brent Suter pitched five efficient innings, Ryan Braun homered and the Milwaukee Brewers beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 3-0 on Monday night to gain ground in the NL playoff chase.

Milwaukee pulled within 3 1/2 games of the Cubs in the NL Central and two games behind the Rockies for the final NL wild card. Chicago and Colorado were both off Monday.

Suter (3-2) allowed five hits and struck out four, throwing just 64 pitches before handing off to the bullpen. Five relievers split the final four innings, with Corey Knebel pitching the ninth for his 36th save in 41 tries.

Marlins 13, Mets 1

Giancarlo Stanton hit his 55th homer - and his first in nine days - while driving in four runs to help the Miami Marlins beat the New York Mets 13-1 Monday night.

Batting third for the first time this year, Stanton hit a three-run line drive into the home run sculpture at Marlins Park in the fourth inning against Matt Harvey (5-6). With that, the MLB home run leader ended a drought of 29 at-bats without one.