KANSAS CITY, Mo. _ Entering Sunday's game, the Royals owned baseball's best ERA among starting pitchers and the Angels' had the second-worst.
Ian Kennedy made sure the Royals maintained their trend. Tyler Skaggs was totally out of character for the Angels.
A pitcher's duel on an overcast Sunday at Kauffman Stadium produced the best starting pitching effort of the season by both teams and a 1-0 Royals walk-off victory.
Salvador Perez opened the ninth by dropping a single into left field over reliever Blake Parker and gave way to pinch runner Raul Mondesi.
Up stepped Mike Moustakas, the hero of Saturday's 3-2 victory with an eighth-inning go-ahead home run and swinging one the team's hottest bats.
On a 3-2 count, Mousakas drew a walk as Parker's splitter sailed between the legs of catcher Carols Perez. Mondesi, who had stolen second, went to third.
A Paulo Orlando pop-out on the infield brought up Alcides Escobar, who already had two hits on the day. His third _ against a defensive alignment that included five infielders and two outfielders _ plated Mondesi and allowed the Royals to complete the series sweep while improving to 6-6 on the season.
Skaggs went seven innings, the longest outing by a Angels starter this year, and struck out nine.
Kennedy was even better, finishing off a scoreless stint after eight innings with 10 strikeouts and two hits over 111 pitches.
Kennedy hit double-digit strikeouts for the 13th time in his career. When he gave way to reliever Kelvin Herrera in the ninth, Kennedy had lowered the team's ERA to 2.31, and his own from 4.09 to 2.37. The starters have surrendered 19 earned runs in 74 innings this season.
Royals threatened early, getting two runners on in each of the first two innings against Skaggs, whose 8.71 ERA entering the game contributed to the Angels' 6.02 mark, good for 29th in baseball.
But the Royals couldn't come up with the key hit, nor could they in the third when Lorenzo Cain led off with a walk. It was Cain's 11th free pass of the season, and he entered the day tied for second in the American League in that department.
After Escobar's single in the second, the Royals went without a hit until he dropped a one-out single to right in the seventh.
The Angels got their first hit with two outs in the fifth when C.J. Cron roped a line drive past shortstop Escobar and turned it into a hustle double. But Kennedy struck out Danny Espinosa to end the inning.
Kennedy had retired the first nine batters before issuing a four-pitch walk to Yunel Escobar to open the fourth. But a couple of pitches later, Kennedy coaxed a double play ball from Ben Revere.
