De Vries pitches Twins past Royals
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Cole De Vries tossed 6 2/3 strong innings on Saturday and the Minnesota Twins dropped the Kansas City Royals, 3-1, in game one of a doubleheader at Kauffman Stadium.
De Vries (4-5) allowed just one run on seven hits with three strikeouts and did not walk a batter to record his second consecutive positive decision. Alex Burnett and Jared Burton combined for 1 1/3 innings of scoreless relief and Glen Perkins worked around a two-out hit-by-pitch in the ninth to notch his ninth save.
Justin Morneau drove in a pair of runs and Ryan Doumit added an RBI single for the Twins, who have won two of their last three games. Jamey Carroll had three hits in the victory.
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Will Smith (4-7) was saddled with the loss after allowing three runs on nine hits and two walks over six-plus innings. He struck out four.
Johnny Giavotella drove in the only run with a single for the Royals, who had their three-game winning streak snapped.
Minnesota jumped on top with a run in the first inning courtesy of a two-out RBI double by Morneau.
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Pedro Florimon started the Minnesota fifth with a bunt single and Darin Mastroianni followed with a base hit up the middle to put runners on first and second. Both runners advanced on a sac bunt by Carroll and Josh Willingham was intentionally walked to load the bases.
Morneau then knocked in his second run of the game with a sacrifice fly and Doumit plated Mastroianni with a single to extend the Twins' lead to 3-0.
Mike Moustakas began the Kansas City seventh with a single and Brayan Pena followed with a base hit. Giavotella got the Royals on the board three batters later with a single to left, cutting the deficit to 3-1.
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In the ninth, Perkins fanned Moustakas and got Pena to ground out before plunking Jeff Francoeur. Francoeur then went to second on a defensive indifference, but Perkins induced a game-ending groundout from Eric Hosmer.
Game Notes
Despite Friday's washout, the Royals finished the month of August with a 17-11 overall mark, the best ledger for that month since going 15-14 in 2000 ... De Vries improved to 3-0 in his career against the Royals, while Smith dropped to 0-2 against Minnesota ... Minnesota finished 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position and stranded eight on base ... The Twins improved to 24-24 against intra-division competition.