Beckett Goes 7-0; Tigers Win 8th Straight; Glavine Wins #294

Tuesday's Peak Performers and Fabulous Flops American League Normally, the Detroit Tigers get most of their offense from guys like Ivan Rodriguez, Magglio Ordonez and Carlos Guillen, but last night, seldom used Omar Infante provided some spark at the bottom of the lineup. Filling in at center field, Infante singled, doubled, tripled, drove in 4 runs and scored twice, helping the Tigers outlast the visiting Mariners, 9-7. The Tigers continued their relentless pursuit of Cleveland with their 8th straight win and stand just 1/2 game behind the Indians in the AL Central. Josh Beckett (right) gave up a leadoff home run to Alex Rios, but shut the door after that and his teammates scored 8 runs in the first three innings as Boston beat Toronto, 9-2 and Beckett earned his 7th victory without a loss, working 7 innings of 5-hit ball, walking 1 while striking out 5. Rios' homer was the only earned run off the Boston ace. The Sox goosed their AL East lead to 6, as the Blue Jays lost their 7th straight. The teams will complete a three-game set Wednesday and Thursday in Toronto. Cleveland starter Cliff Lee, who spent April on the DL, delivered a complete game 3-hitter as the Indians stayed just ahead of the streaking Tigers with a 3-1 win at the LA Angels. Lee didn't allow a hit until the 6th inning, and threw 102 pitches.

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It was win #50 in his 4-year career, all of which has been with Cleveland Justin Morneau.banged a pair of homers, the second a 3-run shot in the 10th inning which provided the winning margin as the Twins outlasted the White Sox, 7-4. Morneau drove in 4 and scored twice, and now has 8 dingers on the season. Other AL Scores Baltimore 8 Tampa Bay 3 NY Yankees 8 Texas 2 - A. Rodriguez, HR (15) Oakland 6 Kansas City 1 - C. Gaudin (W, 2-1), 8 Ks National League Tom Glavine took another step closer to Cooperstown with a smooth 7-hit, 7-inning performance, leading the NY Mets to a 4-1 win at San Francisco. Glavine (4-1) won the 294th game of his stellar career despite allowing Barry Bonds to swat his 11th home run of the season and 745th career home run, just 10 short of Hank Aaron's all-time record. Glavine gave up just the lone homer, walking 1 and striking out 5. Billy Wagner worked the 9th for his 7th save. The win kept the Mets and Braves deadlocked atop the NL East at 20-12. Alfonso Soriano and Derrek Lee extended their hitting streaks to 16 and 15 games respectively, but the visiting Pittsburgh Pirates got the last laugh, winning 4-3 in 15 innings. Soriano went 3-6 and Lee had just 1 hit in 7 at-bats, dropping his batting average to a relatively pedestrian (.398). Other NL Scores Florida 6 LA Dodgers 5 - M. Cabrera, HR (8), 3 RBI, .351 Houston 7 Cincinnati 6 - C. Lee, HR (6), 2 RBI (31) leads NL Atlanta 3 San Diego 2 Milwaukee 6 Washington 4 - Brewers, 4 straight wins, lead NL Cent. by 6 1/2 Arizona 3 Philadelphia 2 St. Louis 4 Colorado 1 - J. Isringhausen, S (9)