KANSAS CITY, Mo. _ The baseball jumped off the bat of Eric Hosmer, and the race was on. The only questions: Would Baltimore center fielder Adam Jones chase down a drive in right-center field? Would Lorenzo Cain have enough speed to score from first base?
Both answers went the Royals' way. Hosmer, once mired in a brutal April slump, came through with an RBI double in the bottom of the eighth on Friday as the Royals secured a 3-2 victory over the Baltimore Orioles at Kauffman Stadium.
The moment was vintage Royals _ a clutch hit from Hosmer, a feat of speed from Cain _ and the combination delivered a fourth victory in five nights. On the heels of a series victory in Tampa Bay, the Royals (14-21) returned home and notched a victory against the first-place Orioles.
Royals starter Danny Duffy allowed two runs and eight hits in seven innings, lowering his ERA to 3.38. Joakim Soria offered another scoreless inning in the eighth. Kelvin Herrera notched his sixth save, overcoming a poor decision by right fielder Jorge Soler in the ninth.
With two outs and nobody on, Soler dived for a sinking liner and played a potential single from Caleb Joseph into a triple. Moments later, Herrera managed put down the threat.
Brandon Moss clubbed his fifth homer. Lorenzo Cain delivered an RBI double in the first. The Royals had just enough offense.
On early Friday afternoon, Royals manager Ned Yost returned to his office at Kauffman Stadium and juggled his lineup once more. After three victories in four days against the Rays at Tropicana Field, Yost was not moving shortstop Alcides Escobar from the leadoff spot.
The decision to return Escobar to the top of the spot on Monday, a statistically dubious proposition, had resulted in 21 runs in four games. So that was that. But Yost did make other tweaks. He moved struggling outfielder Alex Gordon to the ninth spot after his batting average sagged to .158 on Thursday afternoon. He returned Moss to the designated hitter spot after a day off on Thursday.
Gordon had started a game in the ninth spot just once in his career _ on July 29, 2010, just days after he returned from a stint at Class AAA Omaha. Yet Yost was looking for any sign of hope.
"He's working on some things," Yost said. "He looks a little better in batting practice, but transitioning from BP to the game is a pretty big thing."
For most of the night, Gordon was still searching for comfort at the plate. He finished 0 for 1 with a walk and a strikeout before exiting for pinch hitter Jorge Bonifacio in the bottom of the seventh. He was diagnosed with tightness in his right groin and listed as day to day.
Yet as Gordon struggled, Moss, a gluttonous strikeout machine in the season's first six weeks, delivered a thunderous shot in the fifth, crushing a solo homer into the top deck of the fountains against Orioles starter Dylan Bundy. The baseball soared a projected 456 feet and splashed into the Water Spectacular, giving the Royals a 2-1 lead. Moments later, an unidentified man jumped into the fountains to retrieve the baseball before climbing back toward the outfield concourse. The man was apprehended and arrested by the Kansas City Police Department, according to a Royals spokesperson.
The lead would last until the top of the seventh. Joseph opened the inning with his second double off Duffy. He advanced to third on a sacrifice bunt before Duffy spiked a slider against Joey Rickard, allowing Joseph to score on a wild pitch that bounced back to the screen.
The Royals had opened the scoring in the bottom of first, when Mike Moustakas and Cain struck for back-to-back doubles against Bundy, a former top prospect from Owasso, Okla. The Orioles would respond in the top of the second, when Joseph thumped a 2-1 fastball into the gap in left-center field.
By the end, the Royals had scored the final run. It finally held up.
