Felix Hernandez pitched a five hit game and Nelson Cruz hit his major league-leading ninth home run as the Seattle Mariners beat the Minnesota Twins 2-0 on Friday night.
Cruz led off the second inning with a drive that traveled into the second deck above the bullpens in left field off Phil Hughes (0-4). Cruz now has more homers than both the Twins and Milwaukee Brewers this season.
Hernandez (3-0) retired his first 14 batters before Trevor Plouffe singled with two outs in the fifth. He struck out nine in his first complete-game win since beating Minnesota on Aug. 27, 2012.
ANGELS 3, RANGERS 2
In Anaheim, California, David Freese hit a go-ahead homer for the Angels, while Garrett Richards pitched seven effective innings for his first win since injuring his knee last year.
Richards (1-1) allowed two runs and three hits in his fifth straight win over the Rangers. Joe Smith pitched a perfect eighth and Huston Street worked a hitless ninth for his sixth save.
In other results, it was:
‧ Dodgers 3, Padres 0
‧ Yankees 6, Mets 1
‧ Red Sox 7, Orioles 5
‧ Indians 13, Tigers 1
‧ Cardinals 3, Brewers 0
‧ Marlins 3, Nationals 2
‧ Astros 5, Athletics 4
‧ Pirates 4, Diamondbacks 1
‧ Rockies 6, Giants 4
‧ Phillies 1, Braves 0
‧ Cubs 7, Reds 3
‧ Rays 12, Blue Jays 3
‧ Royals 2, White Sox 2
Taiwanese tennis veteran Hsieh Su-wei (謝淑薇) and her Latvian partner Jelena Ostapenko finished runners-up in the Wimbledon women's doubles final yesterday, losing 6-3, 2-6, 4-6. The three-set match against Veronika Kudermetova of Russia and Elise Mertens of Belgium lasted two hours and 23 minutes. The loss denied 39-year-old Hsieh a chance to claim her 10th Grand Slam title. Although the Taiwanese-Latvian duo trailed 1-3 in the opening set, they rallied with two service breaks to take it 6-3. In the second set, Mertens and Kudermetova raced to a 5-1 lead and wrapped it up 6-2 to even the match. In the final set, Hsieh and
Taiwanese tennis veteran Hsieh Su-wei and her Latvian partner, Jelena Ostapenko, advanced to the Wimbledon women’s doubles final on Friday, defeating top seeds Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic and Taylor Townsend of the US in straight sets. The fourth-seeded duo bounced back quickly after losing their opening service game, capitalizing on frequent unforced errors by their opponents to take the first set 7-5. Maintaining their momentum in the second set, Hsieh and Ostapenko broke serve early and held their lead to close out the match 6-4. They are set to face the eighth-seeded pair of Veronika Kudermetova of Russia and Elise Mertens
Outside Anfield, the red sea of tributes to Diogo Jota and his brother, Andre Silva, has continued to grow this week, along with questions over whether Liverpool could play at Preston today, their first game since the brothers’ tragic loss. Inside Anfield, and specifically a grieving Liverpool dressing room, there was no major debate over the pre-season friendly. The English Premier League champions intend to honor their teammate in the best way they know how. It would be only 10 days since the deaths of Jota and Silva when Liverpool appear at Deepdale Stadium for what is certain to be a hugely
ON A KNEE: In the MLB’s equivalent of soccer’s penalty-kicks shoot-out, the game was decided by three batters from each side taking three swings each off coaches Kyle Schwarber was nervous. He had played in Game 7 of the MLB World Series and homered for the US in the World Baseball Classic (WBC), but he had never walked up to the plate in an All-Star Game swing-off. No one had. “That’s kind of like the baseball version of a shoot-out,” Schwarber said after homering on all three of his swings, going down to his left knee on the final one, to overcome a two-homer deficit. That held up when Jonathan Aranda fell short on the American League’s final three swings, giving the National League a 4-3 swing-off win after
RSS