Schilling Pitches Red Sox to Victory

Pitching with power and purpose on a healthy ankle this time, Curt Schilling came through with another clutch performance at Yankee Stadium.

Schilling threw eight sharp innings for his first win since returning to Boston’s rotation, and Manny Ramirez broke out of a rare slump with a homer and three runs batted in to lead the Red Sox past New York, 9-2, on Saturday.

“That’s the Schilling that everybody knows,” teammate David Ortiz said.

Playing without offensive catalyst Johnny Damon, the Red Sox piled up 16 hits and rebounded from a sloppy performance in their series-opening 8-4 loss. Boston regained a four-game lead in the AL East over the Yankees, who fell 1 1/2 games behind Cleveland in the wild-card race.

“We’re running out of games,” Yankee Manager Joe Torre said. “This is our playoffs right now. We need to fight our way into the postseason.”

John Olerud also homered off a shaky Shawn Chacon, who was chased during a six-run fourth. The Yankees made two ugly errors in the inning and blew a pair of potential double plays that could have limited the damage.

Oakland 5, Texas 4 -- Rookie Dan Johnson hit the first grand slam of his career as the Athletics picked up their sixth straight win at Arlington, Texas.

Oakland remained one game behind the Angels in the AL West. The A’s are 30-9 on the road since June 10, the best road mark in the majors in that span. Mark Teixeira hit his 38th homer, and Michael Young and David Dellucci added homers for the Rangers, who increased their major league-leading total to 238.

Cleveland 7, Minnesota 5 -- Coco Crisp and Jhonny Peralta homered, and the Indians rallied at home to open a 1 1/2 -game lead in the AL wild-card race. Scott Elarton (9-7) gave up two runs and six hits in eight innings for Cleveland.

The Indians have won 17 of their last 22 games to surge ahead of the New York Yankees and Oakland in the chase for the wild-card berth.

Toronto 3, Tampa Bay 2 -- Gregg Zaun and Russ Adams hit consecutive RBI singles in the ninth inning for the Blue Jays at St. Petersburg, Fla. Scott Kazmir struck out a career-high 11 in seven innings and Damon Hollins hit a two-run homer for the Devil Rays.

Detroit 4, Kansas City 3 -- Carlos Pena led off the eighth inning with a tiebreaking home run, and the Tigers won at home to end their nine-game losing streak.

Baltimore 5, Seattle 3 -- Melvin Mora drove in three runs for the Orioles at Seattle. Oriole starter Rodrigo Lopez, who had lost three of his previous four starts, beat the Mariners for the third time in three meetings this season.