Clemens Earns Milestone Victory

Roger Clemens keeps climbing the career victory list, catching one Hall of Famer after another.

The Rocket won his fifth consecutive start, Jason Giambi and Jorge Posada hit consecutive home runs, and the New York Yankees defeated Tampa Bay, 10-3, Tuesday night at New York for their seventh victory in a row.

Clemens (6-2) cruised to his 286th victory, tying Hall of Famer Robin Roberts for 23rd place. Clemens has an action photo of Roberts in his locker, along with pictures of some of the other pitchers he has passed this season such as Jim Kaat and Ferguson Jenkins.

“To have the opportunity to chase down some great names this year like I have makes it fun,” Clemens said. “I still enjoy challenges. To hear interesting stories about these guys, I’d love to have more of a chance to visit with these guys and find out more.”

The benches and bullpens emptied after Derek Jeter took exception to a high-and-tight pitch from reliever Jesus Colome in the eighth inning. No punches were thrown.

“[Colome] almost killed [Alfonso] Soriano,” Jeter said. “When I stole third he was staring at me and when I scored he was staring at me. It wasn’t like I was going to charge the mound, I was just trying to make a point.”

Colome said he wasn’t throwing at anybody.

“I was very surprised over Jeter’s reaction because I didn’t mean to hit anybody. I just couldn’t throw strikes,” Colome said through a translator. “I think maybe Jeter is overreacting. That is the kind of player Jeter is, he’s very intense, very competitive.”

Cleveland 6, Baltimore 5--Matt Lawton hit a two-run homer with two out in the bottom of the ninth and the Indians rallied for four runs in their final at-bat.

Lawton hit a 2-and-2 pitch from Jorge Julio (2-2) over the wall in right field to end a three-game losing streak for the Indians, who were one out away from their 20th loss in 26 games.

Boston 6, Oakland 2--Rickey Henderson drove in two runs at Boston in place of the injured Manny Ramirez, and John Burkett (4-0) gave up nine hits in six innings.

Boston started a 13-game homestand by winning for the ninth time in 11 games and improved baseball’s best record to 26-9.

Tim Hudson (3-5) walked six in 51/3 innings and has lost three in a row for the first time in his career.

Toronto 6, Seattle 3--Tom Wilson homered twice and hit a go-ahead single in the sixth inning at Toronto.

It was the first multihomer game for Wilson, who had a career-high four runs batted in.

Kansas City 8, Minnesota 1--A.J. Hinch homered and tied a career-high with four RBIs, and slumping Chuck Knoblauch also hit a home run for the Royals at Kansas City, Mo.

Knoblauch, batting .184 entering the game, connected against Matt Kinney (1-3) for the 30th leadoff homer of his career.

Chicago 15, Texas 4--Tony Graffanino had two homers and six RBIs at Chicago, and Mark Buehrle won his AL-leading seventh game.

Graffanino tied his career high with four hits, helping the White Sox end a four-game skid.

After going 54 games without a homer, Graffanino has hit three in his last two games.

Buehrle (7-2) gave up four runs--three earned--and six hits in seven innings.