Royals 4, Indians 2

Royals hold off Indians in 4-2 victory.

On Monday the Royals beat the last place Indians 4-2. The Royals are now 4-3 on the season and tied for first place with the Chicago White Sox.

Zack Greinke started for the Royals and pitched five scoreless innings. Greinke finished the day with nine strikouts and 104 pitches thrown. So far Greinke has been perfect this season. He has not given up a run in eleven innings and is 2-0.

The Royals jumped out to an early 3-0 lead against starter Fausto Carmona. It wasn't until Carmona threw 42 pitches he got out of the inning.

In the fourth inning Mike Jacobs hit his first home run as a Royal. Last year he hit 32 home runs with Florida. Jacobs said "Anytime you can get that first one out of the way, it's a good thing, I want to hit home runs here as well."

The Indians left a dozen runners on base and went 4-13 with runners in scoring position. Travis Hafner struck out three times and stranded eight runners and Jhonny Peralta stranded eight as well.

Indians manager Eric Wedge said "We squandered too many opportunities."

After Greinke came out Jamey Wright and Kyle Farnsworth did not allow the Indians to get a hit in three innings. In the ninth Ron Mahay gave up two singles before being replaced by Joakim Soria. Soria allowed two singles to Sizemore and Choo. Choo's base hit scored one, a wild pitch scored another and moved the runners into scoring position.

Soria was faced with runners at second and third and no outs. He then retired the next three batters. He struck out Victor Martinez, got Hafner the hit a dribbler to the mound, and struck Peralta out looking on a 3-2 curveball.

Pertaining to his 3-2 curveball Soria said "I've got confidence in that pitch and I just throw it. They can't hit it."

Royals manager Trey Hillman said "I sure didn't like seeing that tying run get to second base and the meat of their order coming up. But Joakim did what he usually does. He doesn't let his heart rate get up there too much and got a couple of big strikeouts."

The Royals have two more games against the Indians at home on Tuesday and Wednesday.