A’s Overmatched Against Loaiza

Esteban Loaiza gave up only four hits over eight innings as the Chicago White Sox defeated the Oakland Athletics, 5-1, Sunday at Chicago.

The White Sox have won 17 of their last 22 games and remain half a game behind Kansas City in the Central Division.

Loaiza (15-5) was impressive in outpitching rookie Rich Harden. He retired 17 of 18 batters between the second and seventh innings before giving up a double to Scott Hatteberg. He gave up Adam Melhuse’s home run in the eighth.

Loaiza’s league-leading earned-run average dropped from 2.30 to 2.24 in winning his fourth consecutive decision.

Harden (3-1) failed to go six innings for the first time in five big league starts. In five innings, he gave up two runs and six hits and left after throwing 109 pitches. He struck out eight, including the side in the first inning, and walked one.

Kansas City 7, Tampa Bay 3 -- Julius Matos homered and drove in three runs to lead the Central Division-leading Royals at St. Petersburg, Fla. Matos had a two-run single during the Royals’ five-run first inning and hit his second homer of the season in the fourth.

Seattle 8, New York 6 -- John Olerud drew a bases-loaded walk from Antonio Osuna that broke an eighth-inning tie at Yankee Stadium. Bret Boone, Randy Winn and Ichiro Suzuki got the big hits when the Mariners chased Roger Clemens in a five-run seventh that made it 6-4.

After the Yankees tied it against Arthur Rhodes, Olerud walked on four straight pitches from Osuna (2-4) with two outs in the eighth.

Baltimore 5, Boston 3 -- Jack Cust had a two-run homer and an RBI double, and Jason Johnson (10-5) pitched six strong innings -- giving up two runs and six hits -- at Fenway Park.

The Orioles took three of four from the Red Sox to leave them three games behind the Yankees in the East Division.

Minnesota 4, Detroit 3 -- Corey Koskie and Dustan Mohr each drove in a pair of first-inning runs at Detroit to help the Twins win another game against the Tigers.

The win was Minnesota’s 20th in its last 21 games against Detroit, including an 11-1 record this season. The Tigers are 5-18 since the All-Star break and a season-worst 55 games under .500.

Texas 5, Toronto 4 -- Alex Rodriguez homered for the seventh time in 10 games to lead the Rangers at Toronto. It was his 31st homer of the season and 20th of his career at SkyDome, surpassing Manny Ramirez for the most by a visiting player. Texas has hit 22 home runs in the last nine games and leads the majors with 179.