Meadows, Rays rally past Boston
Austin Meadows hit a tying, inside-the-park homer in the ninth inning, Nelson Cruz had a go-ahead single in the 10th, and the Tampa Bay Rays rallied from a six-run deficit to beat the Boston Red Sox, 1110, Monday at Fenway Park in Boston.
The AL East-leading Rays took advantage of four errors, the biggest when center fielder Alex Verdugo appeared to lose Cruz’s high fly in the sun with bases loaded and two outs in the fourth. The ball glanced off Verdugo’s glove and Cruz wound up circling the bases, scoring on second baseman Taylor Motter’s wild throw that let Tampa Bay close to 7- 5 against ace Chris Sale.
Cruz also homered and had two RBI singles as the Rays increased their AL East lead to 8½ games over New York.
Other games
Blue Jays 8, Yankees 0:
Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hit his 40th homer, Marcus Semien went deep twice and visiting Toronto won its fifth in a row with a win against Jameson Taillon and New York. Hyun Jin Ryu (13-8) pitched six effective innings as the Blue Jays won for the eighth time in nine games. The Yankees lost for the seventh time in nine games.
Dodgers 5, Cardinals 1:
Max Scherzer struck out 13 in his hometown and Chris Taylor hit a two-run homer, leading Los Angeles to a win in St. Louis. Scherzer (13-4) permitted one unearned run and six hits in eight innings. The three-time Cy Young Award winner is six strikeouts away from becoming the 19th player in big league history to reach 3,000.
Giants 10, Rockies 5:
Thairo Estrada hit two of San Francisco’s four home runs, and Kevin Gausman (13-5) pitched seven solid innings, as the Giants remained one game ahead of the Dodgers in the NL West.
Phillies 12, Brewers 0: Bryce Harper hit an early home run, Brad Miller connected twice and Jean Segura added a grand slam, leading Zack Wheeler (12-9) and visiting Philadelphia to the win. Andrew McCutchen and Freddy Galvis also homered as Philadelphia beat NL Central-leading Milwaukee for the five consecutive times this year.
Cubs 4, Reds 3: Frank Schwindel hit a tiebreaking RBI single in the eighth inning, and host Chicago earned its season-high seventh win in a row. The Reds (73-66) lost for the seventh time in nine games. They dropped to one game back of idle San Diego for the second NL wild card.
Nationals 4, Mets 3: Carter Kieboom and Andrew Stevenson hit RBI singles in the ninth off Edwin Díaz, and host Wasington rallied in the finale of a five-game series. Pete Alonso hit his 30th home run of the season for New York, which fell four games behind idle Atlanta in the NL East.
Royals 3, Orioles 2: Andrew Benintendi hit a go-ahead single for visiting Kansas City in the eighth inning, then reached above the left-field wall to take away a potential tying home run in the ninth.
Twins 5, Indians 2: Jorge Polanco hit his 27th homer in the third and doubled in the first, fifth and seventh innings to lead Minnesota past host Cleveland.
Astros 11, Mariners 2: Rookie Jake Meyers homered and drove in four runs as host Houston jumped on Yusei Kikuchi early and sailed to an 11-2 win over Seattle. Kikuchi (7-8) allowed three hits but was done in by an error behind him and four walks over 1⅔ innings in his shortest start this season.