Royals Roll a Seven, Rally Past White Sox

Aaron Guiel and the Kansas City Royals aren’t quite ready to hand over control of their division.

Guiel hit a three-run double in a seven-run sixth inning and Kansas City beat the Chicago White Sox, 13-9, on Monday night at Chicago to extend its American League Central lead to three games.

The Royals ended a five-game losing streak to the second-place White Sox and recaptured some of the momentum they lost after being swept by Chicago in a three-game series at home last week.

“When we had that series in Kansas City, I think what they thought was, ‘Now it’s our turn to step to the front and run with this,’ ” Guiel said. “Tonight was such an important game because they felt like maybe they were going to overtake us.”

Chicago pulled to within one percentage point of Kansas City by sweeping the Royals and taking the first of three games against Seattle. But three straight losses have knocked the White Sox back in the standings.

Joe Crede’s three-run homer capped a four-run fifth and put Chicago up, 6-3. However, the White Sox bullpen couldn’t hold the lead.

Recently acquired Scott Schoeneweis (2-2) came in for starter Jon Garland and failed to get an out in the seven-run sixth, giving up four runs, three hits and a walk before leaving to boos.

Chicago added two in the sixth to make it 10-8 on Ken Harvey’s throwing error and Frank Thomas’ long homer to left-center, his 2,000th career hit.

Jose Valentin homered in the seventh to cut the deficit to 10-9, but the Royals added three runs in the ninth on an error by Crede at third and RBI singles by Dee Brown, who had a career-high four hits, and Joe Randa.

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Tampa Bay 10, Toronto 1 -- Victor Zambrano threw seven scoreless innings and Julio Lugo homered and tied a career high with five runs batted in as Tampa Bay won at St. Petersburg, Fla. Zambrano (9-5) gave up seven hits in winning for the eighth time since June 1. The crowd of 8,193 was the smallest home crowd in Tampa Bay history.

Toronto starter Cory Lidle (11-10) lost for the sixth time in his last seven decisions. He gave up eight runs and eight hits in 5 2/3 innings.

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Minnesota 3, Baltimore 2 -- Minnesota scored two sixth-inning runs on a throwing error by Brian Roberts to ruin the debut of Damian Moss at Baltimore. Brad Radke (8-9) gave up two runs and seven hits in 6 1/3 innings and Eddie Guardado got three outs for his 100th career save -- and 25th this season -- for the Twins.