For Martinez, Average Is Good Enough

Pedro Martinez called it an average outing.

He gave up one run and five hits and struck out 13 in seven innings as the Boston Red Sox defeated the Oakland Athletics, 7-2, Saturday at Oakland.

“I didn’t feel as well as I expected, but I managed to work my way around and come up with a win with an average outing,” he said.

Martinez (5-1), who has an American League-leading 61 strikeouts this season, has had at least 10 strikeouts in his last four starts. His only loss this season came against the Chicago White Sox on April 15.

Martinez has struck out at least 10 in 12 games with the Red Sox and in 39 games during his career. He struck out a career-high 14 Detroit batters on June 14, 1997, while with Montreal.

After Saturday’s game, Martinez was stunned with his total.

“I didn’t know I had so many strikeouts,” he said. “I thought I had seven. Thirteen? I didn’t expect to have that today.”

Mike Stanley, who had a run-scoring double for Boston, said Martinez makes sure there aren’t any big innings for the opposing team.

“He’s so dominant you feel good every time he takes the hill,” Stanley said. “You just hope the offense can get him a couple of runs. It’s almost like, ‘There’s your run, now go get them.’ That’s how good he is.”

Troy O’Leary homered for the Red Sox, who have won just seven games in their last 18 after winning the first five games of the season.

The Red Sox rocked A’s starter Gil Heredia (1-2) for four runs in the fourth inning.

Stanley’s double scored Nomar Garciaparra before Darren Lewis doubled in Stanley, Trot Nixon doubled in Lewis and Jose Offerman singled in Nixon to give the Red Sox a 5-0 lead.

New York 8, Kansas City 4--One day after the Royals hit five home runs and beat the Yankees for the first time in 13 games, they got only two hits and no runs in seven inning against David Cone.

Cone (4-0), who has given up only 11 hits in 33 innings, lowered his major league-leading earned-run average to 0.82. He struck out seven, walked three and is 4-0 for the first time in his 13-year career.

Cone handed an 8-0 lead to Tony Fossas starting the eighth but four batters later, Larry Sutton hit Fossas’ 3-2 pitch for his first grand slam.

Toronto 9, Seattle 3--Pat Kelly drove in four runs and reliever Thomas Davey retired Ken Griffey Jr. with the bases loaded in the sixth inning to help the Blue Jays win at Seattle.

Davey relieved Chris Carpenter with the bases loaded and two out. Griffey, looking to become the first player in major league history to hit a grand slam in three consecutive games, lined out to Davey to end the inning. Davey yielded two hits in 3 1/3 innings for his first major league save.

Carpenter (3-1) pitched 5 2/3 innings, yielding nine hits and three runs to win his third consecutive decision. After the Mariners scored a 33 runs in their previous two games, Carpenter blanked them for four innings before giving up David Segui’s three-run homer in the fifth.

Cleveland 5, Texas 3--Dwight Gooden did his homework and reversed conventional pitching philosophy to beat the Rangers at Arlington, Texas.

After watching the Rangers cheat on teammate Bartolo Colon’s fastball in a 7-5 loss Friday, Gooden, instead of throwing breaking pitches ahead in the count and fastballs from behind, took the opposite approach and gave up only five hits in six innings and struck out three.

“Watching Colon last night, I noticed they were cheating a little and looking for fastballs when he got behind,” Gooden said. “I was able to get the breaking ball over and throw it from behind in the count.”

The game was delayed 32 minutes by rain after the first pitch of the second inning. Manny Ramirez welcomed Ranger starter Aaron Sele (3-2) back by sending his first pitch into the left-field seats for his eighth homer and league-leading 31st RBI.

Minnesota 7, Baltimore 2--Brad Radke pitched an eight-hitter and Ron Coomer hit a three-run homer at Baltimore as the Twins prevented the Orioles from starting their first winning streak of the season.

Coomer’s home run gave Minnesota a 5-0 lead in the third inning and Radke (3-2) made the advantage stand up. He struck out six and walked two in pitching the Twins’ first complete game of the season.