AMERICAN LEAGUE ROUNDUP : Brewers Delay A’s Quest in West; Blue Jays Close In on Title in East

Greg Vaughn, whose home runs twice delayed Oakland’s plans to clinch the West Division, might have been the only member of the Milwaukee Brewers not excited about a three-game sweep of the Athletics.

“It’s just another game,” Vaughn said Sunday after he hit a two-run shot that helped give the Brewers a 5-3 victory at Milwaukee. “I didn’t get caught up in the excitement.”

Vaughn hit his 23rd homer in the third inning as the Brewers extended their win streak to six games. The Brewers, however, remained 2 1/2 games behind first-place Toronto, which reduced its magic number to four with a 12-2 victory at New York on the strength of Jack Morris’ 20th victory.

The Brewers finish the season with six games on the West Coast, while the Blue Jays conclude the season at home.

The A’s went into the day with a magic number of one for clinching their fourth division title in five years. Second-place Minnesota staved off elimination by beating Kansas City, 4-0.

The A’s, who have lost five of their last six, also saw Manager Tony La Russa, Ricky Henderson and Bob Welch ejected during the eighth inning.

The A’s were behind, 5-3, when Henderson was tossed for arguing a called strike with umpire Greg Kosc. La Russa was ejected when he picked up Henderson’s bat and went to the plate to continue the argument. Welch was tossed from the dugout.

The only positive for the A’s is that they can clinch the division at home.

“We have no pressure on us,” Oakland pitcher Dave Stewart said. “The pressure is on the Twins. Every team we play and every pitching staff we face are not going to be playing like these guys here.”

Jaime Navarro (17-11) pitched 7 2/3 innings for the victory. Doug Henry got two outs for his 28th save.

Mark McGwire hit his 41st home run for the A’s.

Toronto 12, New York 2--The victory at New York helped the Blue Jays close in on their second consecutive East title, their third in four years.

The Blue Jays endured a two-hour rain delay in the top of the fifth, when they were five outs short of the game being official.

Morris (20-6), given a 9-0 lead in the first three innings, continued after the delay and gave up three hits in six innings.

Toronto’s first four batters--Devon White, Roberto Alomar, Joe Carter and John Olerud--went 10 for 10 with two walks in the first three innings.

Minnesota 4, Kansas City 0--John Smiley gave up five hits--none of them to George Brett--in the victory at Minneapolis.

Brett went hitless for the first time in five games. He needs four hits in seven games to reach 3,000.

Smiley (15-9), who has not allowed a runner past second base in 20 1/3 innings, won his first game in nearly a month.

Shane Mack hit his 16th homer.

Detroit 13, Cleveland 3--Sparky Anderson became the winningest manager in Tiger history as Cecil Fielder hit his 34th homer, Rob Deer hit his 33rd and Mickey Tettleton hit his 32nd at Detroit.

Anderson, in his 14th season as Detroit’s manager, won his 1,132nd game. He moved past Hughie Jennings, who managed the Tigers from 1907 through 1920.

Boston 6, Baltimore 1--Wade Boggs got four hits and Joe Hesketh--subbing for injured Roger Clemens--gave up four hits in eight innings as the Red Sox won at Baltimore.

It was the 13th loss in 20 games for the Orioles, who were mathematically eliminated form the AL East race when Toronto defeated New York. The Orioles were only a half-game out of first on Sept. 5.

Clemens left the game with a pulled right groin after taking his warm-up pitches before the bottom of the first inning.

“I’ve got quite a bit of soreness, even after icing it,” Clemens said. “I couldn’t push off. I asked (catcher Tony) Pena if there was any velocity on what I was throwing, and he said no.”

Hesketh (7-9) allowed four hits in eight innings to earn his first victory since Aug. 4.