KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Jason Vargas dazzled for the third straight start, the Royals finally scored off Giants ace Madison Bumgarner and Kansas City beat San Francisco 2-0 on Wednesday night to split their two-game series.
Vargas (3-0) scattered four hits over seven innings with nine strikeouts and no walks, his 12th straight start allowing two runs or fewer — the longest streak by a left-hander in franchise history.
The veteran is also unbeaten in his last eight home starts.
Joakim Soria pitched a perfect eighth inning in relief of Vargas, and Kelvin Herrera worked around a leadoff walk in the ninth to earn his third save and finish a 5-3 homestand for the Royals.
Bumgarner (0-3) matched Vargas pitch for pitch until the fifth, when Paulo Orlando managed a one-out single. He stole second, took third on a groundout and went home when Mike Moustakas delivered a base hit, his first with runners in scoring position this season.
That ended Bumgarner's streak of 18 scoreless innings against the Royals, dating to the 2014 World Series opener. That run of dominance included a brilliant start later in the Series and five innings of scoreless relief in Game 7, when Bumgarner earned the save that finished the championship.
Bumgarner allowed one run, seven hits and a walk while striking out four but was done in by another poor night by San Francisco's offense. The lanky left-hander has only received five total runs of support in his first four starts, including one run or none in three of them.
Salvador Perez added an RBI single in the eighth, just the third run surrendered by Giants relievers in the past nine games.
AMERICAN LEAGUE
YANKEES 9, WHITE SOX 1 Aaron Judge hit a long homer, Masahiro Tanaka pitched seven innings of one-run ball and the New York Yankees beat the Chicago White Sox 9-1 Wednesday night to wrap a superb homestand. New York went 8-1 in its first stretch at Yankee Stadium this season, its most wins in a homestand since going 9-1 from July 17-26, 2009. Judge followed Starlin Castro’s three-run shot in the fifth with his 448-foot drive for the Yankees’ first back-to-back homers of the season. Chase Headley and Aaron Hicks also went deep to give New York a season high four home runs.
BLUE JAYS 3, RED SOX 0 Francisco Liriano and three relievers combined on a six-hitter, Darwin Barney hit a two-run single and the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Boston Red Sox 3-0 on Wednesday night. Kevin Pillar had three hits for the second straight game and stole two bases as the Blue Jays won for the third time this season and improved to 2-6 on their homestand. Toronto scored three unearned runs in the second after Troy Tulowitzki reached leading off on a throwing error by third baseman Pablo Sandoval. Tulowitzki took third and Russell Martin reached second on a fielding error by first baseman Mitch Moreland. Barney singled with one out, and Ezequiel Carrera had a two-out RBI single. AL Cy Young Award winner Rick Porcello (1-2) allowed six hits in seven innings, struck out five and walked one.
ATHLETICS 9, RANGERS 1 Khris Davis hit his seventh home run of the season, Yonder Alonso and Chad Pinder also went deep, and the Oakland Athletics routed the Texas Rangers 9-1 on Wednesday. Josh Phegley hit a two-run double in a four-run first that gave a quick lead to Jesse Hahn (1-1), who allowed one run and two hits over six innings, struck out four and walked four. Phegley made his second start since he was brought up from the on April 5; he allowed two runs over six innings of relief at the Rangers on April 7. Davis hit a two-run homer in the fifth, his third home run in six games. All three homers were hit off reliever Mike Hauschild.
NATIONAL LEAGUE
CARDINALS 2, PIRATES 1 Dexter Fowler hit his first two home runs for the St. Louis Cardinals, who swept the Pirates on Wednesday with their third straight 2-1 victory over Pittsburgh. Fowler had three of the Cardinals’ eight hits, hitting a third-inning drive into the rightfield bullpen and a shot down the right-field line in the fifth, both off Gerrit Cole (1-2). Josh Bell had tied the score with a fourth-inning homer to center against Michael Wacha (2-1), who had retired his first 10 batters.
CUBS 7, BREWERS 4 Addison Russell hit a three-run homer off Neftali Feliz that capped a four-run ninth inning and lifted the Chicago Cubs over the Milwaukee Brewers 7-4 Wednesday. Chicago trailed 4-1 before Willson Contreras’ RBI single in the sixth Carlos Torres, and Russell’s run-scoring single cut the deficit to one run in the eighth. Trying for his first four-out save this year, Feliz (0-2) struck out Javier Baez to strand a runner on third. But Jon Jay walked with one out in the ninth, took third on a single by pinch-hitter Miguel Montero and scored on Kris Bryant’s single.