KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Jered Weaver outpitched Zack Greinke in seven scoreless innings and Torii Hunter homered for the second straight game, helping the Los Angeles Angels beat the Kansas City Royals 5-4 on Thursday.
Weaver (5-2) was sharp for the fourth straight start, getting his first win since May 7 behind a suddenly-hitting Los Angeles offense that knocked around Greinke (1-7).
The Angels had 12 hits after getting 14 the night before, the biggest blow Hunter's two-run homer in the fifth inning. Los Angeles (28-28) has won seven of nine to reach .500 for the first time since April 30.
Greinke seemed off-kilter for the second straight home start, extending his post-Cy Young misery by allowing four runs on 10 hits in six innings.
Kansas City scored two runs in the eighth off Kevin Jepsen and pulled to 5-4 on Willie Bloomquist's pinch-hit, two-run homer off Brian Fuentes in the ninth. Fuentes then walked pinch hitter Mike Aviles with two outs, but struck out Scott Podsednik looking for his seventh save in 10 chances.
The marquee for this game billed two aces looking for a win.
Weaver opened the season 4-1, but hadn't won in five previous starts despite allowing more than two earned runs once.
Bad as it's been, Greinke's probably envious.
A year after a Zack-tastical run to the AL Cy Young Award, the spotlight-avoiding right-hander has idled in traffic behind low run support.
It's not that the Royals can't hit; they entered Thursday's game second in the majors at .277.
But for Greinke, they've been stinky.
Kansas City averages 2.87 runs per game behind him, third-fewest in the AL, and he's allowed two earned runs or fewer seven times without a win, the hardest to take a 1-0 loss to Boston his previous start.
Greinke again didn't get much help, but wasn't particularly sharp, either.
Erick Aybar doubled on his first pitch — he was thrown out trying to stretch it to a triple — and Michael Ryan led off the second with another double, scoring on Kevin Frandsen's run-scoring single.
Hunter made it 3-0 in the fifth with his homer into the fountains in left-center and another run scored in the sixth when catcher Jason Kendall failed to tag Reggie Willits at home after third baseman Alberto Callaspo stepped on the base and threw home with one out and the bases loaded.
Weaver had the Royals flailing most of the day, scattering four hits and striking out nine. He was tested just once, escaping a two-on, one-out jam in the fifth inning with a strikeout and a nifty backhanded snare by Frandsen at third.
Weaver's day was uneventful, but plate umpire Mike Estabrook's sure wasn't.
He got into a shouting match with Angels manager Mike Scioscia after a called strike on Podsednik — a call in the Angels' favor — in the first inning and ejected Royals manager Ned Yost in the third. Yost got tossed for getting in Estabrook's face after the umpire bent down to say something to Kendall following a close two-strike pitch on Hunter.
NOTES: Los Angeles has 11 homers in six games. ... Billy Butler, Kansas City's leading hitter, went 1 for 15 in the series after going hitless in four at-bats Thursday.
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