MAJOR LEAGUES
San Francisco avoided a rare four-game series sweep at home by beating the Washington Nationals 7-1 on Thursday, with veteran pitcher Tim Hudson continuing his impressive form for the majors-leading Giants.
The win opened an 8.5 game lead for the Giants at the top of the National League West, while National League Central leaders the Milwaukee Brewers pushed their lead out to 5.5 games with a 13-inning win over the New York Mets.
Photo: Kelley L. Cox-USA Today
Among the other games, the Baltimore Orioles closed the gap on Toronto with a home win over the Blue Jays and the New York Yankees completed their first three-game sweep of the season in Seattle, with Derek Jeter leading the way.
San Francisco’s Tim Hudson (7-2) allowed only one unearned run in seven innings, lowering his major league-best earned run average to a miserly 1.81. The Giants are 7-0 at home when Hudson starts.
Michael Morse got three hits and scored twice for San Franciso, who had won five straight before the Nationals came to town and took the first three games of the series.
Baltimore moved within 3.5 games of American League East leaders Toronto by downing the Blue Jays 4-2.
Kevin Gausman (2-1) gave up one run over six innings and Delmon Young homered for the Orioles.
Toronto have lost five of six to give up much of what had been a commanding lead at the top of the division.
Milwaukee’s Jonathan Lucroy hit a tiebreaking homer in a four-run 13th inning that lifted the Brewers over the Mets 5-1.
Ryan Braun opened the 13th with an infield single off Carlos Torres (2-4). Lucroy drove a pitch over left field and the margin was padded by Mark Reynolds’ RBI single and a hit batter when the bases were loaded.
The Mets stranded seven runners from the ninth through the 11th inning and blew a bases-loaded opportunity with a chance to win. They lost for the eighth time in nine games and fell a season-worst eight games under .500 at 29-37.
Their cross-town rivals, the Yankees, fared better, winning 6-3 against the Seattle Mariners.
Derek Jeter, making his final regular season appearance in Seattle, had three hits, two runs scored and two RBIs.
Jacoby Ellsbury hit a two-run homer in the first inning to extend his hitting streak to 16 games and gave starter Chase Whitley (2-0) an early lead.
Detroit’s Max Scherzer pitched a shutout in his first career complete game, guiding the Tigers to a 4-0 win at the Chicago White Sox.
Scherzer (8-2) was back in form, striking out eight and allowing only three runners to reach second base.
Victor Martinez hit his 16th homer of the season, a solo shot to lead off the fifth.
Cincinnati’s Todd Frazier hit a two-run homer to power the Reds to a 4-1 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers, splitting their four-game series.
Frazier’s hit came off Zack Greinke (8-3) , whose record at Great American Ball Park going into the game was 4-0.
The Reds won the last two games to finish a 5-5 homestand that left them stuck closer to the bottom of the National League Central than the top.
The Colorado Rockies won 10-3 at home against the Atlanta Braves in a game of several ejections that followed an incident in which Corey Dickerson hit Braves catcher Gerald Laird in the facemask during his backswing.
Boston’s Jon Lester worked into the eighth inning to guide the Red Sox to a much-needed 5-2 win over the Cleveland Indians.
Houston’s Chris Carter homered leading off the bottom of the 10th inning to give the Astros a 5-4 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Pittsburgh’s Andrew McCutchen had two doubles and two RBIs to help the Pirates beat the Chicago Cubs 4-0.
Philadelphia’s Reid Brignac lined a tiebreaking, two-run double in the sixth inning and John Mayberry Jr padded the lead with a three-run homer to give the Phillies a 7-3 win over the San Diego Padres.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but