Vargas snaps losing streak as Royals top the Twins

KANSAS CITY — Jason Vargas snapped a personal four-game losing streak with his career high 15th victory, Brandon Moss homered and drove in four runs and the Kansas City Royals beat the Minnesota Twins 11-3 on Sunday.

Moss had an RBI double in a sixrun second inning and a three-run homer in the seventh.

Eric Hosmer doubled twice among his four hits for his fourth straight multi-hit game. He has 12 hits in his past 15 at-bats to raise his average to .328.

Vargas (15-10) gave up a run and four hits over five innings. He was 2-7 with an 8.13 ERA in his previous 11 starts.

Vargas’ previous season-high was 14 victories in 2012 with the Seattle Mariners.

Byron Buxton tripled and scored on a sacrifice fly in the second for the only run against the Royals’ starter. Vargas worked out of a bases loaded jam in the fifth when Brian Dozier grounded into an inning-ending double play.

The Royals sent 11 men to the plate in a six-run second inning off

Bartolo Colon (6-12). Hosmer led off with a single, his first of two hits in the inning.

Alcides Escobar contributed a two-run single, while Moss, Alex Gordon and Whit Merrifield had run-producing doubles.

Colon retired only five of the 11 batters he faced for his shortest outing of the year. Kenny Vargas belted a two-run homer in the Twins’ ninth.

The victory allowed the Royals to split the series after losing the first two games to the Twins. Kansas City is back at .500 (71-71) and moved them within 21/2 games of Minnesota for the second wildcard berth.

YANKEES 16, RANGERS 7 Aaron Judge became the second major league rookie with a 40-homer season, going deep twice as the AL wild card-leading New York Yankees got a series clinching 16-7 win over the Texas Rangers on Sunday.

Gary Sanchez also hit two solo homers for the Yankees, giving him 30 this season and 50 in his 161 games since his 2015 debut.

With Judge’s AL-best 40th homer in the fourth, the 25-year-old joined Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle as the only Yankees to hit 40 homers at age 25 or younger. Judge added No. 41 two innings later, a drive that would have gone 463 feet unimpeded, according to MLB’s Statcast. RAYS 4, RED SOX 1 Reigning AL Cy Young Award winner Rick Porcello was dealt his major

league-leading 17th loss, the victim of poor run support once again as the Tampa Bay Rays beat the Boston Red Sox 4-1 Sunday.

Porcello (9-17) took a 1-0 lead into the fifth, when Wilson Ramos and Evan Longoria hit RBI singles. Boston has scored two runs or fewer 18 times in 30 starts while Porcello was in the game. He gave up five hits in five innings.

NATIONAL LEAGUE

CARDINALS 7, PIRATES 0 Yadier Molina’s teammates could tell their All-Star catcher was not happy.

After taking a fastball from Ivan Nova high and tight, Molina hit the next pitch for a three-run homer

to help the St. Louis Cardinal beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 7-0 on Sunday. “Everyone knows don’t mess with Yadi,” St. Louis infielder Kolten Wong said. “After that, you could tell he’s (ticked) off. He took it out on the baseball.”

St. Louis, which has won three in a row and seven of eight, moved two games behind Chicago in the NL Central. The Cardinals are 21/2 behind Colorado for the second NL wild card. Michael Wacha tossed eight scoreless innings and Randal Grichuk added a solo homer for St. Louis, which improved to 8-2 in September and moved to a season-high seven games over .500. Molina tied a career-high with five RBI. Wacha (12-7) allowed five hits while striking out seven and did not walk a batter in getting his third win in three starts.

NATIONALS 3, PHILLIES 2 The Washington Nationals became the first team in the majors to clinch a playoff spot this season, winning the NL East on Sunday as Stephen Strasburg extended his scoreless streak to a franchise-record 34 innings in a 3-2 win over the Philadelphia Phillies. More than 90 minutes after Washington finished off the Phillies, Nationals Park erupted again when Lane Adams hit a two-run, 11th-inning homer to lead Atlanta over second-place Miami, sealing the division title for the fourth time in six years.

BREWERS 3, CUBS 1 Travis Shaw hit a tworun homer to back Zach Davies, and the Milwaukee Brewers beat the Chicago Cubs 3-1 Sunday to complete a three-game sweep and close within two games of the NL Central leaders. Chicago entered the series with a five-game division lead, a season high, but the defending World Series champions totaled three runs in the series. Milwaukee is tied for second in the NL Central

with St. Louis.

Davies (17-8) allowed one run and seven hits in seven innings, Anthony Swarzak pitched a hitless eighth and Corey Knebel finished for his 34th save in 39 chances.

BRAVES 10, MARLINS 8 Rio Ruiz had a tying, two-run single with two outs in a three-run ninth inning and Lane Adams hit a two-run homer off Vance Worley in the 11th that gave the Atlanta Braves a 10-8 win over the Miami Marlins on Sunday, clinching the NL East for the Washington Nationals.

Miami’s Dee Gordon broke an eighth-inning tie with his first career pinch-homer. Christian Yelich hit an RBI double in the ninth and scored on Justin Bour’s sacrifice fly to boost the lead to 8-5. Freddie Freeman singled against Jarlin Garcia with one out in the bottom half, and Nick Markakis doubled. Tyler Flowers hit a run-scoring groundout, Lance Adams walked and Johan Camargo hit an infield single to shortstop off Javy Guerra, loading the bases. With the Braves down to their last strike, Ruiz followed with a smash that bounced over the glove off third baseman Brian Anderson as two runs scored.

INTERLEAGUE

WHITE SOX 8, GIANTS 1 Jose Abreu hit two home runs and Carson Fulmer won his first major league game as a starter as the Chicago White Sox beat the San Francisco Giants 8-1 on Sunday in an interleague matchup of last-place teams.

A day after hitting for the cycle in a 13-1 victory over the Giants, Abreu recorded his fourth multi-homer game of the season and 10th of his four-year major-league career.