AMERICAN LEAGUE ROUNDUP : Indians Beat Blue Jays for 6th Win in Row

Sometimes it seems nobody is good enough to win the American League East.

Just when it appeared the Toronto Blue Jays were going to take command, they went into another slump.

Candy Maldonado and Chris James hit consecutive home runs in the sixth inning Saturday at Toronto to lead the Cleveland Indians to a 5-2 victory over the Blue Jays.

Their second win in a row over the Blue Jays ran the Indians’ winning streak to six games and kept the Blue Jays from breaking their tie with the Boston Red Sox for first place.

With 10 games remaining, both have 82-70 records. The Red Sox seem to have the better schedule, playing eight at home, while the Blue Jays play nine on the road. Today, the Blue Jays will play their last home game of the regular season.

Toronto’s Kelly Gruber says he’s tired of hearing the whispers that the Blue Jays will find a way to lose the pennant.

“We came back from 6 1/2 games, and people are saying we’re choking,” said the third baseman after hitting his 29th home run. “I’m not concerned. We’re talented and we’ll win some games.”

The Blue Jays spent the day missing opportunities to score off Jeff Shaw (3-4).

They had 12 hits in 6 2/3 innings, but scored only two runs. Their last hope ended when Doug Jones came in to strike out two of the three batters he faced to register his 40th save. Jones has five saves since Monday.

New York 5, Boston 2--They waited five hours in New York for the rain to stop and for most of the evening it appeared a good thing for the Red Sox that the game was played.

But, after getting six strong innings from Mike Boddicker and taking a 2-1 lead, the Red Sox bullpen faltered and the Yankees ended their seven-game losing streak.

Although he seemed bothered by the muddy mound and walked five batters and made two wild pitches, Boddicker, seeking his sixth victory in a row, gave up just four hits and a run.

The Yankees tied it when relief pitcher Larry Andersen threw away a potential double play ball in the seventh inning.

The Yankees broke it open in the eighth against Jeff Gray (2-4). Former Dodger Steve Sax had the big hit, a two-run triple that broke the 2-2 tie.

In the top of the eighth the Red Sox missed a chance to regain the lead. They had runners on first and second with one out, but Eric Plunk (6-3), the winner in relief, got Tom Brunansky to hit into a double play.

The delay is believed the longest for a game that was played. Earlier this season Texas and Chicago waited 7 1/2 hours, but the game was never played.

The crowd was announced as 37,795, but fewer than half were around for the start. By the time the 3 1/2-hour game ended, most of those had departed, too.

Oakland 5, Detroit 1--Scott Sanderson gained his career-high 17th victory and Rickey Henderson hit his 27th home run as the Athletics moved closer to their third division title in a row at Oakland.

Although he moved within five steals of Lou Brock’s lifetime record of 938, Henderson lost ground in the batting race by going one for four. George Brett was four for four and is at .332, 10 points ahead of Henderson.

Sanderson (17-10) gave up three hits and an unearned run in 6 1/3 innings.

“I don’t want to talk about it till it’s done,” Manager Tony La Russa of the A’s said, “but we’re fast approaching one of those special days.”