Knoblauch’s Hr Downs Cleveland

American League

Chuck Knoblauch almost never swings for the fence, so his heroics Tuesday night must have happened by mistake.

“I screwed up, didn’t I - me hitting a home run?” Knoblauch said after his two-out home run in the ninth inning gave the Minnesota Twins a 6-5 victory over the Cleveland Indians in Cleveland.

The Indians, owners of baseball’s best record at 59-27, have won games in the late innings all year. But the magic has worn off lately, and they have lost five of their last seven games.

“We left 13 people on base,” Cleveland manager Mike Hargrove said. “We had our chances. We just couldn’t drive in the key run. It can’t happen every night, and it just didn’t happen for us tonight.”

The Twins won for the second time in six games. Minnesota has the majors’ worst record, 31-56.

The Twins had two runners thrown out in the ninth - Dan Masteller tried to stretch a double into a triple and Pat Meares tried to steal second - before Knoblauch drove a 3-1 pitch from Julian Tavarez (6-1) into the bleachers in left.

It was Knoblauch’s third hit of the game and fourth homer of the season. He has hit in 13 straight games.

Pat Mahomes (1-4), the Twins’ fifth pitcher, pitched two-thirds of an inning and walked two before giving way to Scott Watkins, who retired the only batter he faced with one pitch in his major-league debut.

A’s 4, Rangers 3, 11

Oakland

Oakland scored three runs with two out in the bottom of the 11th inning to beat skidding Texas and win their first extra-inning game of the season.

The Athletics, winless in their eight extra-inning games this year, trailed 3-1 in their last at-bat after Luis Ortiz hit a two-run triple.

White Sox 4, Royals 3

Chicago

Dave Righetti pitched into the eighth and Craig Grebeck scored a run and drove in another to lead Chicago over Kansas City.

Red Sox 13, Tigers 3

Detroit

John Valentin drove in a career-high six runs as Boston took advantage of a struggling Mike Moore and beat Detroit.

Yankees 7, Brewers 5

New York

New York overcame shaky pitching from two rookies, an inside-the-park homer and three blown leads to beat Milwaukee for its seventh straight home victory.

Blue Jays, 12, Orioles 10

Baltimore

Domingo Cedeno’s three-run homer capped a six-run ninth that carried Toronto over Baltimore.

A.L. players honored

California rookie outfielder Garret Anderson and Boston knuckleballer Tim Wakefield won player and pitcher of the month honors for July, the American League announced.

Anderson led A.L. batters by hitting .410, and had seven homers and 31 RBIs. He scored 22 runs, had a .686 slugging percentage and a .422 on-base percentage.

Wakefield, who spent last season in the minors, went 6-0 with a 1.53 ERA. In 47 innings, he allowed 41 hits, 14 walks and struck out 34.

Clearing the bases

Cleveland has sold out all 30 of its remaining home games, marking the first time in the franchise’s 95-year history that the club has sold out its inventory of tickets before the end of a season… . Darryl Strawberry is expected to join New York by this weekend, according to Yankees vice president Arthur Richman… . Chicago manager Terry Bevington dropped the appeal of his four-game suspension for fighting with Milwaukee manager Phil Garner during a game July 22, the league announced. Bevington began his suspension Tuesday… . Kirby Puckett of Minnesota has reached base in all 17 of his starts since the All-Star break… . Oakland’s Mark McGwire is expected to be activated today after 15 days on the disabled list with a bruised left foot.