Red Sox 4, Royals 3
BOSTON -- Oh, by the way, they played a baseball game at Fenway Park Friday night.
And the Boston Red Sox won.
On the night Adrian Gonzalez was pulled from the lineup minutes before the start, apparently as part of a blockbuster trade to the Dodgers (which hadn't been announced by the end of the game), the Red Sox snapped a four-game losing streak with a 4-3 win over the Kansas City Royals.
However, continuing even further with the drama that is the Red Sox, winner Jon Lester (8-10) left the game in the eighth inning with an apparent leg injury.
The victory also allowed the Sox, shorthanded with Gonzalez and Nick Punto (also in the proposed deal) unavailable, to keep from falling to a season-worst eight games under .500.
Pedro Ciriaco continued his stunning dream run with a soft two-run double in the seventh inning to bring Boston from behind and reward Lester, who pitched well and won his third straight start before leaving.
David Ortiz, who missed 35 games with an Achilles strain, singled in two runs on the first pitch he saw and doubled on the second, but the Red Sox trailed Bruce Chen and the Royals 3-2 entering the bottom of the seventh.
Vicente Padilla relieved Lester with a 3-0 count on Billy Butler with no one out in the eighth. Butler reached on an infield single and pinch runner Jarrod Dyson stole second, but Padilla, Andrew Miller and Andrew Bailey pitched out of the inning. Bailey, the projected closer who missed most of the season with thumb surgery, then pitched a perfect ninth for his first save with the club, the 76th of his career.
Ciriaco, 12-for-25 in the last six games, delivered against reliever Kelvin Herrera (1-2).
Eric Hosmer homered (No. 12) for the Royals.
The re-done Red Sox lineup jumped to a 2-0 lead and welcomed Ortiz back in the first inning. Ciriaco singled and Jacoby Ellsbury reached on an infield hit. Dustin Pedroia sacrificed the runners into scoring position and Ortiz delivered on the first pitch, extending his long-interrupted hitting streak to 12 games.
The Royals tied it in the third and took a 3-2 lead in the fourth.
In the third, Hosmer led off with his home run. With two out (after an error and a double play), Alcides Escobar walked and then rode home on Alex Gordon's double.
Two Lester walks helped load the bases in the fourth, and Kansas City took the lead when Johnny Giavotella beat out an infield hit to first base, where a clumsy Mauro Gomez was playing for the slick-fielding Gonzalez.
NOTES: The Red Sox went 13-22 with Ortiz on the shelf. ... Reliever Junichi Tazawa was sent to Class AAA Pawtucket to make room for Ortiz. ... The Royals hit .178 with two extra base hits in going 1-2 at Tampa Bay. ... Entering the four-game weekender, the Royals led the all-time series with Boston 217-216. ... Young righty Kyle Zimmer, K.C.'s top pick in the recent draft, underwent minor right elbow surgery, a cleanup that was known about by teams before he was drafted and got a $3 million signing bonus. ... Chen was acquired by the Red Sox from the Royals to pitch the final game of last season (or a possible one-game playoff), but the deal was quashed by the commissioner's office. He pitched five games for the Red Sox in 2003.
