Francisco Lindor was a one-man wrecking machine, blasting a grand slam and a three-run home run to rack up a career-high seven RBIs and lead the visiting Cleveland Indians to a 9-3 shellacking of the Kansas City Royals on Monday at Kauffman Stadium.
Lindor is the fourth player in Indians history to hit a grand slam and a three-run homer in the same game, joining Manny Ramirez, Vic Wertz and Pat Seerey.
Lindor's power display helped struggling Cleveland ace Corey Kluber become the American League's second 12-game winner and gave the Indians just their third win in their past seven games.
Kluber (12-4) allowed three runs in six innings of work. He gave up seven hits, struck out five and didn't walk a batter in his 99-pitch outing.
Kansas City took the lead with two runs in the first inning on Whit Merrifield's solo home run and a single by Salvador Perez that drove home Mike Moustakas.
Cleveland tied things in the third as Michael Brantley's sacrifice fly plated Rajai Davis, and Edwin Encarnacion followed with another sacrifice fly that sent home Lindor.
Then Lindor took charge of the game. His grand slam over the right field fence in the fourth off Royals starter Jakob Junis allowed Yan Gomes, Tyler Naquin and Davis to trot home in front of him and gave Cleveland a 6-2 lead.
Junis was still in the game in the sixth when Lindor ripped his three-run shot, this time to right-center with Naquin and Davis on base.
Junis (5-10) suffered the loss, surrendering nine runs (eight earned) on eight hits while striking out two and walking one.
Davis, who was added to the starting lineup after Lonnie Chisenhall was a late scratch with a left calf strain, had three hits and scored three runs. Jose Ramirez and Gomes joined Lindor with two hits each in the Indians' 11-hit attack.
Kansas City got a run back in the sixth when Jorge Bonifacio singled home Rosell Herrera. Bonifacio had two of the Royals' eight hits in the game, only one of which came after the sixth inning.
--Field Level Media
Cleveland | Kansas City | |
Corey Kluber | Player | Jakob Junis |
Win | W/L | Loss |
6.0 | IP | 5.1 |
5 | Strikeouts | 2 |
7 | Hits | 8 |
4.50 | ERA | 13.50 |
Cleveland | Kansas City | |
Rajai Davis | Player | Jorge Bonifacio |
3 | Hits | 2 |
0 | RBI | 1 |
0 | HR | 0 |
4 | TB | 2 |
1.000 | Avg | .500 |
Team | Hits | HR | TB | Avg | LOB | K | RBI | BB | SB | Errors |
Cleveland | 11 | 2 | 20 | .324 | 9 | 2 | 9 | 2 | 1 | 0 |
Kansas City | 8 | 1 | 12 | .235 | 9 | 5 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 1 |