Rangers recap: Royals match Texas’ comeback bid with late homer

The Rangers showed that never ever quit attitude that has shaped their resurgence in the standings over the past month, but the Kansas City Royals had some, too.

Salvardor Perez turned on a 97 mph fastball from Keone Kela for a solo homer in the eighth to give the Royals a 4-3 win in the series finale at Kauffman Stadium.

Pitching: The Royals scored a run in the first after starter Colby Lewis surrendered two singles and run-scoring sacrifice fly and then hit a batter. But he limited the damage by getting Alex Rios looking at slider to end the inning. A one-out single, which could have been scored an error on shortstop Elvis Andrus, and a double set up another sacrifice fly which scored Omar Infante to make it 2-0. Lewis finally had his first 1-2-3 inning in the third. Rios doubled to lead off the fourth but Lewis induced two popups and had a strikeout to strand him.

Lewis alloed three runs on eight hits and a walk and left with the game tied at 3-3. In the eighth, Keone Kela had two outs before Salvador Perez turned on a 97 mph fastball for a solo homer to left to give Kansas City a 4-3 lead.

Hitting: Mitch Moreland’s double off the wall in the left field corner with two outs in the fourth was Texas’ first hit off starter Jeremy Guthrie. Joey Gallo struck out to end the inning. Moreland collected the Rangers’ next hit, an opposite-field single with one out in the seventh. Gallo followed with a single to center. Guthrie was replaced by Kelvin Herrera to face Andrus. Andrus battled out of an 0-2 hole before an opposite-field single through the right side loaded the bases for Leonys Martin. He, too, was quickly in an 0-2 hole but came back to single through the right side, scoring two runs to make it 3-2. Andrus scored to tie it at 3-3 on Robinson Chirinos’ ground out to shortstop. In the ninth, Greg Holland retired Gallo, Andrus and Martin to get the save.

Notable: Several bad routes by Rangers’ outfielders led two a couple extra-base hits. The Royals had their ninth sell out of the season on Sunday.

This story was originally published June 7, 2015 at 4:27 PM with the headline "Rangers recap: Royals match Texas’ comeback bid with late homer."