AMERICAN LEAGUE ROUNDUP : Clemens Overpowers Powerful Athletics, 2-0

Roger Clemens was struggling because of a tired arm a month ago, but the Boston Red Sox right-hander just kept pitching.

As victories mounted, the tiredness left and he’s overpowering once again.

The Oakland Athletics, who beat Clemens twice earlier in the season, found him at his best Tuesday night at Oakland.

Clemens summoned a little extra after giving up a walk and a two-out hit in the ninth inning and won, 2-0.

It was his fifth consecutive victory--three of them shutouts--and improved Clemens’ record to 17-5.

Clemens gave up five hits and won for the first time at Oakland to give him a victory in every park in the league. He struck out 11 Athletics, who were missing injured Jose Canseco and resting Mark McGwire.

The Athletics had won five in a row.

Toronto 12, Chicago 4--George Bell tied a major league record with three sacrifice flies at Chicago and the Blue Jays romped to a 2-0 lead in the three-game series, which ends tonight.

The Blue Jays are keeping the pressure on the Red Sox, but the White Sox are having a tough time trying to keep up with Oakland. It was Chicago’s third loss in a row.

Todd Stottlemyre (11-13) held the White Sox to two hits in seven innings. The Sox avoided a shutout when they scored four in the ninth inning.

Bell became the eighth player to hit three sacrifice flies in a game. The last to do it was Candy Maldonado of San Francisco in 1987.

“We got our tails kicked,” Manager Jeff Torborg of the White Sox said. “But this club showed me something again. They were cheering each other in the ninth inning and there was nothing phony about it.”

Kansas City 1, Texas 0--Jim Eisenreich, brought into the game in the top of the ninth inning to play right field in a defensive move, led off the bottom of the ninth at Kansas City with his third home run.

Eisenreich hit a 2-and-0 pitch by Gary Mielke (0-2) over the right-field fence to break up a pitchers’ battle.

“It’s great. There’s nothing like hitting a home run, especially to win a game,” said Eisenreich, who hit his first game-winning home run. “I knew I hit it as hard as I could hit it.”

Steve Farr (9-5) pitched three shutout innings of relief to win it. Jamie Moyer held the Royals to two hits in seven innings.

Milwaukee 7, Detroit 6--The Brewers spotted the Tigers five runs in the first inning at Detroit, then stormed back to beat them in the ninth inning.

Gary Sheffield, who was three for four, hit a home run leading off the ninth to tie it, and Mike Felder drove in what proved to be the winning run with a sacrifice fly.

Minnesota 5, Cleveland 4--Kent Hrbek homered and Kirby Puckett had three hits at Cleveland to help Mark Guthrie (4-5) end a three-game losing streak.

Bud Black (10-8), a hot pitcher until recently, lost for the third time in four starts. A weak defense hurt the left-hander, who gave up five runs--two unearned--and 10 hits in five innings. In his last four starts Black has an earned run average of 6.97.

Seattle 7, Baltimore 1--Greg Briley hit two home runs and Matt Young pitched a five-hitter at Seattle as the Mariners ended a three-game losing streak.

Young (6-12) committed his ninth error, tops among pitchers in the majors leagues, but did everything else right until the ninth when he lost his shutout.

Briley hit a two-run home run in the first, and that’s all Young needed.